Court Halts KeNHA Hiring of 27 Road Engineers in Discrimination Row: Details

The Employment and Labour Relations Court suspended the Kenya National Highways Authority recruitment of 27 road engineers on Sunday. The order freezes the entire process until a full hearing determines whether the job criteria unlawfully exclude qualified professionals.

This ruling marks the latest development in a string of legal challenges facing Kenya’s road agencies over how they hire engineering staff. Only days earlier the same court froze hiring at the Kenya Rural Roads Authority for five director and engineer cadres on similar grounds.

At the heart of both disputes lies one requirement in the advertisements: applicants must hold registration with the Engineers Board of Kenya. The Kenya Engineering Technologists Registration Board does not count. Petitioners insist this creates an unfair barrier for technologists who hold equivalent qualifications under separate legislation.

The Institution of Engineering Technology of Kenya filed the petition against KeNHA. The authority first advertised the 27 positions for Engineer (Roads), Grade 7, on December 2 last year and re-advertised them a week later.

Lawyers for the institution told the court that the listed duties match work reserved for holders of Bachelor of Technology in Engineering degrees under the Engineering Technology Act of 2016. Requiring EBK registration alone, they argued, locks out an entire class of trained professionals from public service opportunities.

KeNHA rejected the discrimination charge. Officials said the authority followed Public Service Commission guidelines and approved career progression structures to the letter. In their view engineers and technologists form distinct professional groups with different academic paths, regulatory oversight and day-to-day responsibilities.

Road engineers, the authority explained, handle design work, feasibility studies, quality assurance and final professional decisions on projects. Engineering technologists focus on applied technical tasks and operational support. The two cadres, KeNHA maintained, are not interchangeable.

The judge examined the filings and concluded that the petition raised serious questions worth full argument. The court found a prima facie case with triable issues. Suspending the advertisement, the ruling stated, would prevent any miscarriage of justice and keep the dispute alive until it is decided on merit.

The petitioner had warned that allowing appointments to proceed would render the case pointless once the posts were filled. “EBK and KETRB are legally established statutory bodies,” the petition stated, “therefore it is unlawful, unfair and discriminatory for KeNHA to recognise registration by EBK to the exclusion of KETRB.”

The Engineers Board of Kenya, named as an interested party, backed the authority’s criteria. Its position is that only engineers registered under its mandate can legally perform the roles advertised.

Both sides now prepare for the substantive hearing. The court will examine whether the hiring rules comply with constitutional guarantees of equality and fair access to employment opportunities in the public sector.

The parallel cases at KeNHA and KeRRA have drawn attention to long-running differences between the two regulatory boards. EBK oversees the broader engineering profession while KETRB specifically licenses technologists, regulates their conduct and enforces professional standards.

Observers inside the construction sector note that road agencies form the backbone of Kenya’s transport infrastructure. Any prolonged delay in filling key technical posts could affect ongoing highway maintenance and expansion work, though the court has not addressed operational impacts.

For now the advertisements remain on hold. The outcome of the full hearing will clarify the boundary between the two professional registers and set a precedent for future recruitment across Kenya’s roads authorities.