The Public Service Commission (PSC) has ordered heads of public institutions, State corporations and public universities to declare their vacancy slots right away, the Daily Nation reported. The government is preparing to take on 50,000 interns from January 2027. PSC Chairperson Francis Meja gave the order at the Kenya School of Government. He was addressing a forum for State agencies on human resource management and disciplinary appeals.
Meja said government agencies have taken an average of 8,000 interns. Each parastatal now runs its own internship programme. From next year, these will merge into one national public service internship scheme managed by the PSC. "Immediately you go back, declare the number of vacancies that are available within your institutions," Meja told the agency heads.
He also warned board chairpersons, chief executives, vice-chancellors and college principals not to misuse interns. Meja said some institutions have turned qualified graduates into errand runners instead of mentoring them. Interns have been sent to buy lunch or make photocopies, he said. "They are professionals in their own right, and reducing them to messengers misses the bigger picture," he added.
Internship contracts run for one year. Meja said interns should not expect the government to absorb them. The aim, he said, is to expose them to a working environment. That should help them compete for private sector jobs and apply when the State advertises.
Meja also criticised public bodies for failing to follow the Constitution, the law and HR guidelines. He said some accounting officers ignore PSC directives on disciplinary appeals. As a result, courts have imposed heavy penalties on State agencies, he said, and some officers have been held personally liable. He cited one institution fined Sh10 million over procedural mistakes in a disciplinary case. He described the penalty as entirely avoidable.
Meja said the workshop aims to settle disputes inside institutions before they become formal appeals or court cases. He said the PSC does not want to micro-manage agencies and is seeking partnership instead. He urged accounting officers to follow due process in staff discipline. Doing so, he said, would save public money now spent on legal fees and court awards.