Wamuzi News Ke
The Employment and Labour Relations Court, in a scathing judgment that has sent shockwaves through the private security industry and corporate boardrooms alike, has issued a stern warning to all employers after ruling against years of exploitative underpayment of security guards, marking a case that reveals extensive wage violations across the industry.
In the ruling, the court considered the Kisumu case where nighttime security guard Stephen Onyango, who worked for seven years and was paid a paltry KSh 5,000 a month, which is very much below statutory minimums, won a landmark court award of KSh 169,415 for unpaid wages and leave.
The employer was found to have not only blatantly breached wage laws but also failed to fulfill even the most basic legal requirements as regards the employment of the worker, thereby exposing the court’s non-tolerance for such injustices.
Justice in the labor division took the rare step of publicly admonishing companies that continue to trample on workers’ rights, explicitly placing the responsibility on the employers to comply with the wage regulations that include even the mandatory minimum pay structures established for private security personnel.
This is coupled with the legal precedents that guarantee minimum pay thresholds and the imposition of fines on those who do not comply.
The ruling of the court directly confronts decades of underpayment that became a norm; thus, the guards recruited to protect the lives and properties had to endure poverty-level salaries.
The ruling is a win for the workers’ advocates who see the ruling as a strong reaffirmation of the legal position that employers are prohibited from paying less than the prescribed minimum wages and that strict adherence to workers’ rights laws is mandatory.
Labor rights groups are today calling on regulators and enforcement bodies to take the most decisive action possible against security companies that refuse to pay the stated wages, thereby warning that a failure to enforce the law will be against Kenya’s constitution that protects fair remuneration.
The unions’ uncovering of the non-compliance issue is the reason for this drastic move to court, which has already been accompanied by the KSh 30,000 statutory minimum wage for security guards that was recently affirmed by the court.
The decision is likely to open the doors of justice for workers who have been facing underpayment for a long time, which in turn could lead to changing the employers’ conduct not just in the private security sector but in other areas too.
The employers have been put on alert that the judiciary will not put up with such labor exploitation, as Kenya is taking steps towards 2026 with increased scrutiny of workers’ rights and the justice of wages.
