To
The CEO,
Plan International.
Dear Madam,
REF: CORRUPTION, TRIBALISM, NEPOTISM, FAVORITISM AND IMPUNITY AT PLAN INTERNATIONAL KENYA’S RECRUITMENT PROCESS.
The above subject matter refers.
Kindly take note that on 1st July 2016, Plan International Kenya through an email invited me for an interview for the position of Project Implementation Officer – NORAD to be based at Bondo Program Unit, Kenya which was to be held on 6th July 2016 at Plan Kenya’s Kisumu Program Unit offices.
I indeed attended the interview.
On 25th July 2016, Plan International Kenya through its country Human Resources Administrator Cynthia Tiany communicated to me through an email that I was not successful in the interview.
I returned the email acknowledging the receipt of the regret.
The following day on 26th July 2016, Cynthia Tiany telephoned me and informed me that the regret email was erroneously sent to me as it was meant for a different candidate and not me. She categorically stated to me that I was successful in the interview and that Plan International Kenya had offered me the job.
She further asked me to send her a copy of my ID and latest pay slip to enable them embark on the recruitment process. I sent these documents and she acknowledged receipt.
On this same day (26th July), Cynthia sent me a backup email that I was successful in the interview and consequently instructed me on the tasks and procedures to embark on.
All my three referees were also contacted this same day through emails by the same Cynthia Tiany for reference checks. The emails to them were very categorical – Allan had been considered for the position of Project Implementation Officer at Plan International Kenya.
On 28th July 2016, Cynthia confirmed to me that the background checks were complete and successful, and that I was expected to report on 15th August 2016 at the Bondo Program Unit. This is when I resigned from my previous job as I needed time to prepare and relocate to Bondo and settle down before the 15th of August.
On 29th July 2016, Cynthia telephoned me and informed me that the Country director was out of the office to sign my offer letter and that she would send it by 1st August, 2016.
She further on this same 29th July 2016 through an email sent me a letter to facilitate my medical checks. She on the same email informed me that one of the Program Managers wanted to have a meeting with me on the 3rd of August 2016.
I underwent the medical checks on 1st August 2016 and was found to be medically fit for the job.
It is after this process (according to a reliable internal source at Plan Kenya) that a senior staff at Plan Kenya compromised and influenced the process and ensured I was dropped and her person taken. What an impunity! What an inhumanity!
When I visited Plan Kenya’s Nairobi offices on 3rd August 2016 for the said meeting, I sat at the reception for three good hours, only to be informed that the Manager I was to meet was out of the office and that the meeting would be rescheduled.
About 30 minutes after I left the office and boarded the matatu, I was telephoned that the manager had arrived and that I should return to the office. I had to alight from the matatu and board another one back to the office.
To my surprise, this said manager was in the office all the time I was being kept at the reception. According to her, I was unsuccessful in the NORAD interview and the position had been offered to a different person, and that she was to interview me and see if I can suit a different position! How could this be possible? An interview, while I was invited for a meeting? That I was unsuccessful, while there were several communications that I was successful? Is this fair? Is Plan International really honest? Are you people that selfish? Are your staffs committed to social justice?
In conducting the interview, she was not taking notes, not giving scores and not even listening as she was busy with her phone, a clear indication that it was just a cover up for the impunity and inhumanity that Plan International Kenya of all the organizations had done. Is Plan International really committed to its core values? No it is not!
After this fake and cover up interview, I sought a brief meeting with Cynthia Tiany and she gave me two contradicting information and very different from what the said manager told me! A common character of the lords of impunity!
According to Cynthia; one, they had merged the NORAD Project with ECDE Project as a result of funding cut, and hence I had to be called for a second interview to be questioned on ECDE; and two, ECDE Project was a component of NORAD Project and they forgot to ask ECDE questions during the interview and hence the second interview. Who would believe that? Isn’t Plan International committed to impunity? Do you expect communities to trust you? Is this really Plan International I have been hearing about for years? It is very laughable that the panel forgot to ask some questions during an interview.
Thereafter Plan International Kenya excommunicated me. My emails went un-replied and phone calls unanswered.
After my persistent emails and out of embarrassment, Cynthia Tiany responded to my email dated 8th August 2016 that she was yet to get feedback from the manager. What feedback was this? Why communicate to me that I was successful and engage me in a recruitment process before a complete interview?
On 9th August 2016, I wrote an email to the Country Director Carol Sherman seeking her intervention. She never bothered to intervene nor respond.
I again did her another email on 11th August 2016. She never intervened; neither did she bother to give me a listening year. She only responded to my email in a one line sentence that Felicity Kinoti will get in touch with me. How would Felicity Kinoti intervene on this grave issue while she was part and parcel and the architect of me being short-changed? She had even pocketed bribe!
Felicity Kinoti would on this same 11th August do me an email indicating that I was not successful in the interview. Why did then Cynthia communicate to me that I was successful? Why was I sent for medical checks? What did Plan International want to do with my medical results? Isn’t this a crime? Why did Cynthia do reference checks when I was not successful? Why give me a reporting date? Why make me resign from my previous job and subject me and my family to suffering? Why make my children sleep with empty stomachs while you purport to be committed to child well-being? My children have really suffered because of Plan International which should rather be protecting them.
I thereafter wrote a letter to the country director through an advocate protesting against this kind of impunity and inhumanity that has never been witnessed in any other NGO in Kenya.
Through its advocate, Plan International Kenya responded that I was not successful in the interviews and denied having informed me of being successful. Never informed me of being successful, while it is in black and white?
Having been subjected to lots of suffering by Plan International, I have sued Plan International Kenya seeking compensation for both special and general damages caused to me and my family, more so my innocent children who have really suffered.
The case was filed at Nakuru Labor Relations Court (Case no. 472 of 2016) and Plan International Kenya was served on 8th December 2016.
I am further going to involve civil societies and activists and the general media to make the world know the true character of Plan International.
Should you wish to have all the correspondences, emails and telephone records and recordings, you let me know.
Sincerely yours,
Allan Odhiambo Omollo.
