We shouldn't reward mediocrity
Although we cannot generalise, the majority of the ladies and gentlemen who claim to be academicians are nothing but charlatans.
There is nothing like serious academic work going on at our universities. All they do is recycle material using stone-age textbooks in the name of imparting knowledge. They lack imagination, ideas and drive. Yet they want better pay.
We cannot and should not reward laziness. I would say Jua Kali artisans are more imaginative than some of the lecturers who lay claim to grandiose titles like "think-tanks". At least Jua Kali artisans have come up with various machines used all over Kenya, like water pumps and maize-grinding machines and welding machines.
What can our academics say they have done for this country to alleviate poverty? Can't our engineering departments, for instance, come up with a cheap local motorcycle to replace the notorious boda boda bicycles wreaking havoc on our young men who, in the quest to put ugali on the table, become impotent and suffer a myriad of other medical conditions?
Let the Government get rid of the rot by weeding out the lazy and mediocre lecturers first and then they can negotiate with serious fellows.
Alternatively, let those lecturers who think they have impeccable academic track records resign and look for jobs elsewhere.
As Njaga rightly put it, many of them, including the so-called professors, cannot lay claim to a single publication in an international peer-reviewed journal.
SIMON K, KARIUKI, PhD,
Nairobi.
Lecturers have gone on strike because the Government has neglected the thinking lot of this country for many years.
All public servants are poorly paid to the extent that they live below the poverty line. This is so because, besides food, they have other mandatory obligations from which they cannot divorce themselves - as parents, spouses or social beings.
It is not enough for Cabinet ministers to talk tough or contradict one another the way Education Minister George Saitoti and Finance Minister Daudi Mwiraria have done over the salary demands.
I want to believe that when the Government comes to its senses, it will review once and for all, the salaries not only of lecturers but also of all public servants.
WESECHERE W.,
Nairobi.
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