President Uhuru Kenyatta today signed a new law that will make it hard or job seekers aged above 35 years to secure government jobs. The law compels the Public Service Commission to first prioritse applicants below 35.
The National Youth Employment Authority Bill was sponsored by nominated MP Johstone Sakaja and stipulates the establishment of a database of job seekers below 35 years. It was signed into law on Friday, April 1.
The Public Service Commission will be required to go through the database anytime it wants to recruit for government before advertising for vacancies in the media.
An authority will be formed to assume the functions of the National Employment Bureau whose mandate is to maintain a database for all jobless youth in the country.
The database will have the qualifications, age, ethnicity, sex and county of origin of all job seekers.
The aim of the law is to compel the government into bridging the huge youth unemployment in the country by at least prioritising them for jobs in government and related agencies.
The law will apply to national government, county governments as well as state-owned firms for as long as they are run on taxpayers’ money.
There were earlier concerns about the application of the law raising issues of discrimination on the basis of age which is against the Constitution.
In 2015, the lowest pay difference between the public and private sector widened in favour of the public sector, underlining the sectors attractiveness as the best employer. The least paid public servant earned an average of Ksh47,146 in 2015 compared to Ksh41, 457 in the private sector.
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