Background
At Siasa Place (SP), two of our values are trust and integrity. To practice that, we share our highlights of program achievements that were realized by the organization annually and their contribution towards the realization of organization vision, and mission.
Our programs strategically contribute towards the realization of the organization’s three main program areas being:
- People: where the organization’s aims to capacity build people to have the necessary knowledge and skill to participate in all decision making processes affecting them
- Participation: SP contributed towards mobilizing both youth and government to engage either in decision making or towards improvement of service delivery and
- Policy: SP contributed towards influencing policy implementation.
Introduction
In the year 2019, through various programs, SP organized and or supported public participation forums in various parts of the country through youth barazas and community dialogue meetings. Siasa Place also capacity built both youth and government officials in various ways through which they can work together to promote youth participation in decision making. During the year, the organization hosted 43 tweet chats during the #SiasaWednesday conversations to educate, share and inform the public on various subjects of national interest. Project specific achievements are subsequently highlighted.
ZIVIK IMARA LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT PROJECT
A program designed in partnership between Siasa Place (SP), and Mark Appeal Group (MA) with financial support from ifa (Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen). The leadership program focuses on building the capacity of county ward administrators on how they can promote structured youth engagement in decision making on issues affecting them from the ward level since the ward is the lowest level of representation. The project realized the following achievements
Community partnerships
Through the partnership between local youth organizations, the Executive through the Office of the sub-county administrator and Siasa Place, a total of 9 public participation forums dubbed youth barazas were organized, three per county in Kericho, Busia and Kisumu counties. The forums were aimed at providing youth with opportunities to constructively engage the county officials, share information and learn how best they can engage to influence development within their wards. Details of attendance in the three counties is provided in the matrix.
The impact of community barazas were felt across the implementing counties. For instance, in Kericho County, Kericho Youth Network have established a working relationship with the county assembly committee on youth where they meet in case of need and present their issues of concern. Some community members applauded barazas as a source of information for the community for improving service delivery e.g. in Litein a farmer who had not attended the forum had a sick cow and looked for a private veterinary officer who gave wrong medication and the cow died, but the other cows were still sick, a member who had attended the forum advised him to take the matter to the county agricultural officer who was cheap but effective.
In Busia County, the Busia Youth Steering Committee is engaging the county government on issues of empowering the youth. One of the members has since been appointed as a board member of a local secondary school and the others have since been employed by the government. They are demanding the youth quota in tender awards, economic empowerment fund and are organizing youths to register business.
In Kisumu County, a participant said that Central Nyakach was witnessing public participation for the first time courtesy of the ZIVIK Imara project as previously public participation sessions by the County Government of Kisumu were normally held at the Sub-County headquarters which was very far for most of them to attend. According to a youth, public participation in their sub county is for a select few as citizens are left out.
One participant confessed during the community baraza in Mayenje ward “[due to lack of water] we would wait for the member of parliament to repair but after the forum we mobilized ourselves and started contributing for the repair of the water, nowadays we do not wait which implies that community participation capacity built the people on their responsibilities as well. This was echoed by Central Seme Member of County Assembly ”we (politicians) are seen to solve all community problems ranging from public to private, no wonder politicians are engaging in corruption to have continuous flow of money to meet these demands”
Partnership with Government
The project enabled capacity building of both sub-county and ward administrators on the importance of youth participation, communication as a way of improving stakeholders involvement in development and reducing conflict in development. The training identified the need of working with members of the county assembly and a number of the members were mobilized to have a discussion on how they could support each other and reduce conflict.
In Busia, the external evaluator found that public participation was taking root as Hon Patrick Obuya Member of County Assembly for Marachi Central was now organizing a public participation forum for the ward members to determine how the ward bursary was going to be distributed. Youth from Bunyala also mentioned during the evaluation group discussion that their member of county assembly Hon. Casper was also emulating the same by organizing public participation forums to determine projects that were to be prioritized for implementation by the ward development fund.
In Kisumu County, a participant said that Central Nyakach was witnessing public participation for the first time courtesy of the Zivik Imara project as previously public participation sessions by the County Government of Kisumu were normally held at the Sub-County headquarters which was very far for most of them to attend. According to a youth, public participation in their sub county is for a select few as citizens are left out.
IMARA FELLOWSHIP
Imara Fellowship is a policy-oriented program hosted by Siasa Place (SP) in partnership with Africa Youth Leadership Forum (AYLF) and Mark Appeal Group (MA) with financial support from Ford Foundation. The program is in response to the existing gap in the number of young policy makers grounded in national values and principles of good governance.
The project established and promoted partnership in its implementation. The engagements during project implementation has made it easier for the youth organizations based in the counties to work, collect information and developed into reports to be used to participate in decision making processes. For instance, Kericho Youth Network adopted the report prepared by the Imara Fellows on technical training institutions. They also organized for a meeting to discuss the issues identified and developed a method of follow-up to ensure that the recommendations are considered and implemented. The same has been noted in Kisumu where local organizations led by Jiwo Paro proposed to develop a local follow up mechanism that will help address the issues identified in the youth economic empowerment report shared in Kisumu while Busia Youth Steering Committee supported the project by identifying venues for public participation within the wards and the organizations that could provide internship to the students within the county. The report was shared with the County government of Busia to help in the development of the youth internship policy that the county was in the process of developing to help give youth experience which is a requirement for the job market.
Through the implementation period, the project was able to establish a working relationship with the County Assembly of Kericho and the Kericho Youth Network. Good relationships between Imara Africa leadership program and Kericho Youth Network inspired the confidence of the County Assembly Kericho to share proposed ‘Youth Economic Empowerment’ bill that was being discussed at the Assembly with the Imara fellows to critic and present the youth view on the bill before it could be presented for approval in the Assembly.
The project was also able to develop partnerships with different Youth Serving Organizations. For instance PAWA 254 and WOSWA collaboratively hosted the leadership cafes and the First Youth Baraza respectively in addition to mobilization of the youth and key stakeholders during these activities. The partnership thus reduced the project implementation cost.
Capacity Building
The project registered progress in building the capacity of the youth in two levels. One level, 30 Imara Fellows who were recruited to be trained in policy making process in partnership with the county government in various fields of their interest and careers. Notable cases include the promotion of Ms. Gladys Ndanu (Imara fellow) based on her improved ability to relate with clients on the Universal Health Care in Muranga County thus facilitating her promotion following the involvement of her supervisor in a panel discussion on Universal Health Care during the youth baraza held at the University of Nairobi Parklands campus and Mr. Shadrack Osero(Imara Fellow) was also admitted to the DAAD Helmut Schmidt Program to study Masters in Public Management (MPM) with a specialization in Environment, Sustainability, and Geosciences at the University of Potsdam. His application was based on the work done in partnership between Imara Africa and the county government of Kericho to identify policy gaps and recommend solutions within the Technical and Vocational Educational and Training(TVET) sector.
The second level of capacity improvement is exhibited among the community youth who were the local partners during the implementation where they are able to engage the members of the county assembly to push for the implementation of some of the recommendations that were highlighted in the project report. For instance, Kericho Youth Network were able to hold two meetings with the youthful members of the county assembly to push for the implementation of the report recommendations. The same was replicated in Busia where the steering committee managed to convince the youthful members of the county assembly to raise a motion on youth internship policy. The assembly will thus be discussing the bill with the recommendations from the Imara team.
The chief officer recommended two fellows, Dr. Rono (Imara fellow and resident of Kericho) and Mr Brian Keter (Siasa Place community mobilizer and member of Kericho Youth Network) to the governor for appointment in the board of two different technical training institutions.
Developing Policy Recommendations
The project identified policy issues that Kericho County government was working on within the technical training institutions which included human resource and governance among other functions. Through our collaborative approach, the report was shared and received by both the Assembly and Executive through the Chief Executive Officer responsible for youth, sports and ICT. After engaging the county stakeholders including the county government, youth, instructors, former students of the technical training institutions and other civil societies working around technical training institutions, the report was annexed as part of evidence to persuade Kericho Public Service board to hire more instructors during the financial year 2019/2020
Through the implementation period, the project was able to establish a working relationship in Kisumu County with the different youth led startups and foundations which led to partnerships and collaborative assisted projects for instance the report launch and youth baraza which took place in Kisumu. Some of the local partners involved JIWO PARO ,KONDELE SOCIAL JUSTICE CENTRE & TEAM-Transform Empowerment for Action initiative.
The engagement in Kisumu resulted to identification of new and undocumented sources of income for the youth including prostitution, filming pornographic movies ( a tendency spreading to minors) which could closely be associated with the increase in newer HIV/AIDs infection in the region(prevalence of new infections is high between age 19-24) and a contributor to the high level of people visiting pornographic sites in Kenya. Another emerging trend noted was the high level of youth dependence on betting which sometimes forces the youth to steal or sell family property to gain money for betting. Some of the recommendations like need for entrepreneurial training are already being implemented by Jiwo Paro youth being our implementing partners within the county.
The engagements with the county government of Kisumu were key in understanding and deriving a baseline which would help in the policy formulation process as the infographics in the policy document depended on a lot of government representatives insights which helped in getting the final policy document some key government departments that assisted in the collection of data where the County Director Youth office, Director Youth, Education, ICT, Development Department,Chief Officer Industrialization & Enterprise Development, acting Director Industrialization in charge for training and liaison.
With the support and consistent follow up and engagement with the Busia steering committee, the assembly was able to table a motion on youth internship policy on 6th August 2019. This is despite the slow pace at which things were moving within the county and the political situation that the county has been faced with throughout the project period.
KENYA ACCOUNTABLE AND INCLUSIVE POLITICAL PROCESS (KAIP)
The Kenya Accountable and Inclusive Process project was a one-year grant implemented under a consortium with other organizations and supported by the DFID. The project was aimed at capacity building the youth on the strategies through which they could influence decision-making of CIDP and ADP and service delivery at the local level . Siasa Place was in Busia
The project aimed at capacity building a total of 350 youth from the seven sub counties in different ways through which they could advocate for the needs of the youth to be prioritized within the respective counties.
After the first training, youth were asked to identify three main issues that they felt were of concern and Water, health and joblessness top the list.
From the meetings, they elected two representatives who formed a country steering committee to help in coordination of activities and follow up on the agreed projects. Through the sub-county awareness creation, a total of 564 (291 male and 273 female) youth and 27 (16 male and 11 female) beyond the youth participated
Capacity building of the youth through the Constituency Level Monthly meetings
The project through series of advocacy capacity build youth from all the seven (7) sub counties as detailed in the matrix below:
After the youth were trained on advocacy strategies, several issues that needed application were identified. For instance, Igula dispensary in marachi central ward was constructed without toilets, water, electricity and it was also neglected without service providers like nurses and medical officers.
From the training, the youth agreed on a strategy to communicate with the county on the matter. The administrator then visited the facility and the compound was cleared, a community management committee constituted (Jesca Auguya One of the KAIP committee members was elected to be a member of the committee) and money allocated in the subsequent year.
Hon. Patrick Obuya the MCA Mariachi, central ward confirmed that the memoranda submitted on Igula dispensary bore positive results since the contractor had been identified to do the toilet, Ksh 1,000,000 allocated in the financial year 2019/20, to support operation.
From the training and meetings held, youth complained that they were not aware of what was happening in the county because they were not getting information. As a result they could not take advantage of the opportunities created within the county or objectively contribute to the development of the county. and in line with Article 35, they demanded for a notice board in their respective ward offices.
The county responded by providing a notice board in Matayos South ward administrator office in January 2019 where a youth from Funyula acknowledged the notice board on his personal social media asking why the same had not been provided to them
After the advocacy training and series of planning and strategic meetings, the youth recognized that there were several youth groups doing similar things disjointedly making it difficult to constructively engage the government and achieve results as they were sometimes perceived to be competing. As a result, they agreed to collaborate among themselves leading to the formation of a sub-county based network which brought together several youth groups. The network was later registered as a community based organization under the leadership of Mr. Mwanawari Amira and represented youth organizations from Marachi Central and Kingadole wards.
The main aim of the network was to coordinate advocacy to improve service delivery in the respective wards and after the first meeting they identified stalled projects for follow up during their first meeting
Their colleagues from Budalangi also formed a network of Bunyala youth advocates with the aim of offering civic education as a platform to help them articulate their issues and through the initiative they were able to negotiate space on Bulala FM to discuss part of the things that they were trained on.
The youth realized the importance of engaging their leaders during the strategy and planning meeting held at Samia resort in Funyula constituency on (12th-13th) November 2018. From the discussion, they noted that the county had allocated Ksh 3.5m for the construction of Nambomboto market which had not been implemented. Youth responded by writing a letter on 3rd January 2019 to their member of the County Assembly and copied the ward administrator and the area member of national assembly to urgently convene a meeting to deliberate on the same. There was no response from all the duty bearers hence the youth resorted to mobilize the business community to demonstrate as provided for in Article 37 of the constitution on 15th January 2019. During the demonstration, they demanded for the market to be constructed as the county had allocated money for the same while work never commenced.
YouTube link to KTN news that covered the demonstration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2X1yQGKgaA&feature=youtu.
Ikonzo Market had several issues including insecurity, lack of water and toilet among others. Through the advocacy mounted by the KAIP committee, all the concerned stakeholders were invited to a meeting. Insecurity was addressed immediately as the chief agreed to work with market leadership in addition to encouraging the youth to look for income generating activities. Water and lack of toilet was not discussed as the respective leadership failed to send their representative however, they acted after the youth drafted a memorandum to the county government.
Capacity building of the county youth legislators
The project trained members of the county assembly to enable them to understand how they could closely work with the youth in the process of planning and implementation of the project. details of the youthful members of the county assembly are presented in the matrix.
After the training, members of the assembly understood how they could involve the youth. On Monday 4th February 2019 human rights, justice and legal affairs committee in the County Assembly of Busia held a public forum in Chakol North ward at Asinge Catholic Church to get feedback from the residents on how public participation on the CIDP was done. They reached out to KAIP committee where Mr Fredrick Ekasiba, chair was invited to paint the picture for the committee on what happened during the public participation on CIDP.
While the county government of Busia was conducting public participation on a draft county fiscal strategy paper for the financial year 2019/2020 and mid-term expenditure framework on (19th -20th) February 2019 at Agricultural Training Centre (ATC) Busia. All ward administrators were requested to nominate only two people from their ward to attend, taking into consideration gender, youth and people with disabilities. Five KAIP committee members Frederick Ekasiba Chakol North ward, Stephen Washika Malachi Central ward, Beth Atieno Mulumba ward, John Wabwire Shikuku, Bunyala west and Neriah Bilyah Anya Chakol North ward were among the selected who attended the forum to represent young in their localities.
SOCIAL MEDIA ENGAGEMENTS
Online engagement is one of the organization’s strongest approaches to encourage stakeholders to participate in politics and governance. 2019, Siasa Place hosted a total of 43 twitter engagements under the hashtag dubbed #SiasaWednesday.
The program runs every Wednesday to discuss emerging political and governance issues on day to day running of the country. Utilizing expert opinion on matters, information is broken down in a way that the majority of the population can understand hence giving them opportunity to contribute to the discussion.
From the 43 online discussions, the organization observed that Kenyans were more concerned with seven main areas including:
- Corruption
- Poor state of governance
- Political situation in the country
- Youth unemployment
- Mental health
- Sexual Reproductive Health and Rights
- Universal Health Care
The online engagements realized growth across the platforms with Twitter growing organically by 3,575 from 9,820 to 13,395 followers, Facebook growing from 5103 to 6033 and Instagram from 324 to 450.
On average, participants distribution by sex was 60% male and 40% female while the following topics trended;
- Reclaiming Youth in Devolution:
Trigger: The 6th Annual Devolution Conference the chat aimed to highlight the challenges that youth face in matters of devolution. During the previous year’s conference, 300 young people had been sponsored by the government to attend the conference. However, the selection of the 300 was questionable since some did not attend the conference. Others were mishandled by officials from the ministry staff and leaders. Their participation did not seem to be of any meaningful value.
Under the hashtag #VijanaNaUgatuzi, we had 22.7k impressions from the 3-day period from 4th -6th February 2019 and gained 88 followers from 10,602-10,690.
- Biashara Fund
Trigger: Government was in the process of consolidating all affirmative action funds together. This was in disregard to the challenges which each fund was facing at the time and without going through public participation. The government filed to engage the public and instead surprised people with the merger.
Under the hashtag #BiasharaFundKE, we had 31.2k impressions from the 2-day period from 29th -30th March 2019 and gained 53 followers from 10,867-10,920.
- Sauti Sasa
SAUTI SASA is a youth-led, youth-driven advocacy campaign that calls on duty bearers to adopt a multi-sectoral community-wide approach in addressing teenage pregnancies in Kenya. The campaign originated by AMREF Kenya saw them partner with Siasa Place among other youth organizations to launch the advocacy platform to step-up and end teen pregnancies in Kenya.
Under the hashtag #SautiSasa, the twitter storm launch held on 26th September 2019 saw the chat trend nationwide at number one from 12noon to 5pm with over 3 million impressions in reach during that 1 day period.
Through the online engagements, Siasa Place managed to partner with several organizations such as TransplantEd, Y-ACT, PAWA 254, Badili Africa and Emerging Leaders Foundation to support different campaigns among others together such Universal Health Care, Sauti Sasa Campaign and #NYCTuitakayo.
ABNORMAL DEMOCRATIC TIMES WORKSHOP
Abnormal democratic times workshop (ADTW) was convened on 27th September 2019 at YWCA Nairobi Kenya in partnership between Siasa Place and the social justice centers with the support of the OSIEA to promote, share and support the emergence of unconventional continental democratic movements. 25 African countries were represented.
The aim of the meeting was to identify youth democratic initiatives across the continent, share and create a network for support considering the influence caused by detrimental laws to ensure incumbents remain in power, validation of fraudulent election by world bodies like state electoral bodies, election observation groups, and interference by international companies to ensure their preferred persons are in power.
The workshop mapped and mobilized a total of 65 people representing 25 African countries and democratic initiatives by the youth across these countries. In the workshop, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Senegal, DRC and Kenya had the opportunity to share their experience of the democratic struggles, challenges and how they fairing on with both success and challenges. To facilitate further experience/information sharing, participants asked for the establishment of a social communication platform (WhatsApp) to enable participants to share and for which was established. A lot of information is currently being shared through the same channel in addition to the emails exchanged during the convening.
The convening provided an avenue for learning of new approaches, tools and exchange of ideas for better service delivery. For instance, Tunisia, South Africa and Zimbabwe both were impressed with the Kenyan legal framework and were able to get a copy of the Kenyan constitution for better understanding of the bills of right.
From the engagement, Yet Trust of Zimbabwe has since established a working relationship with Siasa Place to share information considering that both the organizations are working on youth political participation.
Majority of the participants who participated in the post convening evaluation applauded the idea with one describing it as a bold step to facilitate exchange of experiences of democratic developments with a very rich experience for youth movements across the continent. From the report, they recommended that the conference be held annually with guests from the previous year to recommend a person to attend to allow different young people from across the continent to benefit from this experience in making the convening rotational among the countries. They also lauded Brian Kagoro for very insightful presentation, translation team for making francophone speakers feel at home and Kingfisher Casa Hotel for doing a wonderful job.
Link to watch the youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8lXS3l77t4&list=PLr5Lxq8pmpx_FJwelCHuECJMHZGaGzEQM
JIACTIVATE FAYA
Jiactivate Faya is a campaign ignited by a GeoPoll survey which found that Narok, Homa Bay and Kilifi county were the three Counties with highest number of teenage pregnancies, early marriages and limited contraceptive use thus igniting the need for action.
The objective of the campaign was to capture and elevate sentiments and recommendations of Kenyan adolescents and youth and improve their participation and representation in decision-making process in sexual and reproductive health and responsibility curricular and policy
The campaign designated roles to different organizations based on their strength to which Siasa Place was tasked to capacity build youth on advocacy and initiating a campaign from the grassroots in the three counties of Kilifi, Homa Bay and Narok between July and November 2019. A total of 79 youth were trained as detailed in the matrix:
Lessons Learnt
There are uncoordinated efforts to reduce teenage pregnancy by different non governmental organizations. The resources towards these efforts could optimally be used if the organizations worked together and divided roles to support what has not been done. For instance, most of the organizations were focusing on the urban areas of Malindi leaving the interior uncovered. Duplication was mentioned by participants.
The county government of Kilifi in collaboration with other partners formed a children rights volunteer program (locally referred to as Baba watoto or Mama watoto) which is an initiative for reporting people abusing children’s rights. The volunteers also have a very good working relationship with both the village eleders and police through which some of the people targeting children for sex have been arrested.However most of them have been released because majority of the parties involved are afraid of going to court or resort to settling the matter out of court.
The disconnect between the organizations involved in SRHR may limit the level of success. For instance, different organizations working on the same things in the same area but not working together, establishment of very good advocacy structures like having children right volunteers but not known by majority and involvement of families to negotiate with people involved in sexual crime including rape and even some of the parents giving out their children to be married go unoticed. Improvement can easily be realized if the stakeholders are fully involved and priority is given to areas that require much compared to working in areas of convenience.
In Narok, participants narrated how culture is the biggest contributor to early marriages and teen pregnancies, in one instance, a youth explained how the parents especially fathers gave out their young girls because they had developed breasts and thus could make wives. Since Narok County is predominantly inhabited by the Maasai community culture and cultural practices are a big challenge and threat on sexual reproductive and health rights.
During the training the trainees narrated how their push to be involved in the County plans and activities have not borne any fruit as the County government does not involve them in decision making or planning. In one instance, a youth narrated how they tried to push for the Department of Health to be allocated resources for a sensitization program within schools and community health centres but that did not happen.
Homa Bay County had an already existing working relation and structure between the youth organizations and department of health however; the county has consistently failed to support it financially leaving the structure to depend on well-wishers and support of non-Governmental organization. They are seasonal and
Poverty rendered most of the youth vulnerable. For instance, a lady shared that she could be willing to have unprotected sex with an individual with HIV/AIDs to get money and later take post exposure prophylaxis despite knowing the dangers involved.
YOUTH SERVING ORGANIZATIONS NETWORK
In our effort to champion youth participation in the proposed amendment of National Youth Council bill 2019, Siasa Place in partnership with PAWA254 realized that there was a need to scale up the approach and involved other youth organizations. As a result, we were able to mobilize youth serving organizations to collect views, arrange meetings with stakeholders and present a memorandum.
To sustain youth work, the coalition institutionalized its work by having leaders with Siasa Place as the co-convener to the consortium, forming a Facebook page under the name Youth Serving Organizations (YSO).
The coalition now holds regular meetings to champion all issues affecting the youth. So far, the coalition participated in presenting a memorandum on the youth council and have also participated in the campaign on youth unemployment and currently working on mental health bills to be part of primary health care.
Drop your curriculum vitae Campaign (#DropUreCVKE)
The campaign came as a recommendation from the online conversation on youth employment when the President in a public address said that he was not aware why youth were saying they were broke.
As a response, those who participated in the conversion recommended the need to come up with a campaign to share curriculum vitae with the president to help him understand that youth unemployment was the reason why youth are broke and just how much of a concern unemployment is in the country and needs to be considered a disaster.
COURT CASES ON CONSTITUTIONALISM
In pursuit of our value on constitutionalism, the Cabinet secretary ministry of labour and social protection appointed Mrs Mary Wambui Munene to chair national employment authority.
In our view, the appointment violated Articles of the constitution including those on public participation, section 10(1) & (2) of the national employment authority act no.3 of 2016 among other laws in Kenya. As a result we challenged the appointment at the employment and labour relations court petition no. 190 of 2019. (Detailed ruling can be found through the link http://kenyalaw.org/caselaw/cases/view/187196/)
The two Petitions were filed on 18th October, 2019 and 23rd October, 2019 respectively but they were consolidated by consent on 14.11.2019 under Petition 190 of 2019. The Petitions contested the appointment of Mary Wambui Munene as the Chairperson of the National Employment Authority, vide Gazette Notice No. 9816 (Vol. CXXI – No. 137) published on 14th October, 2019.
The Petition therefore seeks the following prayers:
- A declaration that the Interested Party does not meet the required constitutional and statutory requirements, standards, qualifications and experience to be appointed to the position of the Chairperson of the National Employment Authority Board and thus she is unqualified, unsuitable and unfit to serve as chairperson of the national employment authority board.
- A declaration that the purported appointment of the Interested Party to the position of the Chairperson of the National Employment Authority Board vide Gazette Notice No. 9815 (Vol. Cxxi-No. 137) dated 14th October, 2019 did not meet the laid down substantive and procedural constitutional requirements applicable in public service appointments; and is therefore unconstitutional, unlawful, irregular, null and void for being in contravention of Articles 10,27, 73 (2) and 232 of the Constitution of Kenya, 2010.
- A declaration that the 1st Respondent’s purported handpick and appointment of the Interested Party vide Gazette Notice No. 9815 (Vol. Cxxi – No. 137) dated 14th October, 2019, to the position of the Chairperson of the National Employment Authority Board without following the laid out substantive and procedural, constitutional and statutory requirements applicable in public service appointments; the said purported handpick and appointment is unconstitutional, unlawful and irregular for being in contravention of Articles 10,27,73 (2) and 232 of the Constitution Of Kenya , 2010.
- An order quashing Gazette Notice No. 9815 (Vol. Cxxi-No.137) dated 14th October, 2019 vide which the Cabinet Secretary for Labour and Social Protection purported to appoint Mary Wambui Munene as the chairperson of the National Employment Authority Board.
- An order directing the respondents to ensure that future appointments to the National Employment Authority Board of those board members whose membership is not automatic by virtue of their offices pursuant to section 10 (1) of the National Employment Authority Act No. 3 of 2016, strictly adhere to the substantive and procedural, constitutional and statutory requirement applicable in public service.
- A declaration that the 1st and 2nd Respondents have violated the petitioners’ right to access to information contrary to the guarantee under Article 35 of the constitution of Kenya 2010.
- An order of compensation including aggravated damages for violation of the petitioners’ right guaranteed under Article 35 of the Constitution as aforesaid.
- Costs of this petition be borne by the Respondent.
- Such other orders this Honourable Court shall deem fit pursuant to Article 23 (3) of the Constitution of Kenya 2010.
In conclusion the judge found that the appointment of Ms. Mary Wambui Munene as the Chairperson of the National Employment Authority by the 1st respondent vide Gazette Notice No. 9816, CXXI-No. 137 of 14th October, 2019 was irregular, unlawful and unconstitutional because it was done in violation of both substantive and procedural thresholds envisaged in express provisions of the Constitution and statutes.
