Female workers at the Africa Star Railway Operation Company Limited (Afristar), a firm that manages Standard Gauge Railways (SGR) are in complaining mode after the firm shortened their dresses.
“Afristar forces us to dress like women of loose morals. We feel dirty but there’s nothing we can do. Now we have been given a new purple uniform which is shorter, in anticipation of the tourism season. We feel so dirty” a staffer who requested not to be named intimated to us.
There have been complaints about the Chinese led firm, especially on racism and discrimination the most recent case being an incident where senior Kenya Railways officials were humiliated by the Chinese.
Workers at the Africa Star Railway Operation Company have also on many occasions described the working conditions there to be like those in a concentration camp.
The contract terms of the Kenyan staff at Afristar is horrible. There’s no way for one to improve his/her lot in life with such meagre salary and terms.
A Chinese earns a salary of at least 2000 US dollars per month and an upkeep allowance estimated to be 500 US dollars per month while their Kenyan counterpart (Assistant locomotive drivers) earn 470 US dollars.
Apart from low salaries, unfair dismissal is the order of the day.
The situation is made worse by management especially the Deputy general manager (Gachuhi) is blacklisted by the world bank for squandering money in the previous Rift valley railways (RVR) before he was thrown out by Kenya railways.
Sammy Karuga Gachuhi – Deputy General Manager
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