A new report by the Public Service Commission (PSC) has revealed that Rift Valley communities dominate most of the non-competitive State jobs, and hold a substantial 21.8% share, highlighting a lack of ethnic diversity in the public service.
The findings, outlined in the PSC's annual report on the Status of Compliance with Constitution Principles for the Financial Year 2022/2023, focused on recruitment across 47 public offices.
The report highlighted the prevalence of certain communities in public service, with the Mt Kenya communities securing the second-highest representation at 19%, followed by the Nyanza communities 12.4%, and then Western Kenya communities at 9.6% , and the Ukambani communities at 9%.
Ukambani communities also featured prominently holding 9.6 while the Gusii communities and Maasai community accounted for 6.2% and 2.6%, respectively.
Other communities gobbling up a huge percentage of public jobs include those from Taita Taveta at 2.3% and the Mijikenda at 2.1%.
The report points out that 1,193 officers were recruited non-competitively by 47 organizations, representing a 9% rate.
From this number, 250 civil servants, representing 17.3% of the number were appointed as personal staff in the office of the Deputy President and advisers to Cabinet Secretaries who were not subjected to competitive recruitment.
As outlined in the report, the main reasons given by government organisations for the non-competitive appointments included the conversion of temporary appointments to permanent & pensionable terms (35%) and direct (internal) appointments (22.4%).
Other reasons outlined in the report include; the representation of PWDs in the organisation (Kenyatta University) (2%); absorption of casual staff to permanent & pensionable terms (8.2%); and appointment of casual staff (8.1%)
“The highest number of officers recruited non-competitively were drawn from State Corporations and SAGAs with 466 (27.7%) of the total, followed by Ministries and State Departments with 290 (23.4%) officers, ” the report read in part.
Further compounding on the matter was PSC's revelation that most government organisations operated without human service resources causing several disparities.
Conclusively, the PSC made a recommendation that all public organisations comply with the requirement of fair competition and merit in making appointments except in instances where under-representation is being addressed.
