More than 100 kitchen employees at Kyambogo University are on the verge of losing their jobs or being rendered redundant effective July 2018 following the new policy of the university to outsource catering services.
In December last year, Prof. Elly Katunguka, the Kyambogo University Vice Chancellor said they had already started the process to procure private individuals to offer catering services in the three kitchens of the university where students and staff have been receiving their meals.
Kyambogo University has a student population of 25,000 but only about 2000 stay on campus.
The University has three main kitchens where majority of students both residents and nonresidents get their meals from.
The decision to outsource the services is likely to affect close to 100 staffs who have been working as cooks, waitresses, cleaners and domestic bursars.
The proposal to outsource catering services has met stiff resistance from the university staff.
A joint staff assembly involving administrative, academic and support staff held last week rejected the proposal to outsource catering services, saying it would render many people jobless or redundant.
Pastor Michael Eladu, the former Chairperson of the support staff union, National Union of Educational Institutions - NUEI Kyambogo Chapter said the affected employees have scheduled a meeting with the university top management on Monday to discuss the way forward.
Pastor Eladu says staff had a meeting in which they last week rejected the policy of out-sourcing kitchen services.
Rev. Dr. Grace Lubaale, the Chairperson of the Kyambogo University Academic Staff Association - KYUASA says they want the university management to redeploy the staff before they outsource the catering services.
Dr. Lubaale says the affected staffs must be involved in all steps of transfers and restructuring in order not to cause chaos.
Prof. Katunguka says internal negotiations are still ongoing on the matter, adding that nothing has been concluded yet.
"We are negotiating; I don't want to comment on issues that we have not concluded on yet. But just know some are going to be restructured and transferred to other units which need them. In case of those who cannot be absorbed in other units, we will lay them off," he said.