The Ministry of Education wants the Universities Act of 2012 amended to change the way the appointment of public universities' chancellors is done.
According to the ministry, under the amendments, a selection panel constituted by the Education CS will submit three names to the President for appointment.
This came as the ministry questioned the role of the Public Service Commission (PSC) in the appointment of top management in universities.
Universities are grappling with a debt of more than Sh62 billion, with the learning institutions unable to pay suppliers or remit statutory deductions.
Education CS Ezekiel Machogu said governance issues had undermined the performance of universities in the country.
He said public universities performed poorly in international rankings because of limited productivity in research and innovation.
“The Universities Act of 2012 should be amended to provide for the appointment of chancellors of public universities by a selection panel constituted by the CS for Education,” Machogu said.
In a statement to the Senate Committee on Education, the CS said the Presidential Working Party on Education Reform had made several proposals to change the running of universities.
“The involvement of PSC undermined the autonomy of universities and should be discontinued and university councils should be able to recruit managers on their own,” he said.
Machogu further told the Senate that universities were teaching almost the same courses, irrespective of the areas that they were established to pursue.
“There is no coordinated governance of research, with many research institutes in the education sector and the contribution of research to national development is undermined,” he said.
On funding, the CS admitted that the current levels of capitation were inadequate to meet the rising costs of goods and services.
“The government’s expenditure on education is on an upward trend and there is a need to ensure that school managers properly manage the funds allocated to their institutions,” he said.
The CS said some schools in ASAL, urban slums and rural areas with pockets of poverty were unable to enrol the required number of learners to operate optimally.
“This makes it difficult for them to raise sufficient funds through capitation to cover fixed and variable costs,” he said.
The chairperson of the Senate committee Joseph Nyutu lauded the ministry of the new university funding model, saying all poor students would benefit.
He said the ministry had also assured them that schools with special needs learners would be the first to get capitation fees under the new funding model by the government.
“For years, schools with special needs learners have been sidelined leading to suffering of the students and the caregivers but this will now be a thing of the past,” Nyutu said.
