Seth Sindani Panyako, one of Kenya’s most combative trade union figures, has quietly been dropped from a government board, marking an abrupt end to his nearly three-year stint in a State appointment that many viewed as politically sensitive from the start.
In a Kenya Gazette notice dated January 23, 2026, Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi Ng’ongo revoked Panyako’s appointment as a member of the Local Authorities Provident Fund Board. No reasons were given for the dismissal, a silence that has only intensified speculation about the political calculations behind the decision.
Panyako was appointed to the board in March 2023, at a time when the Kenya Kwanza administration was attempting to project inclusivity by accommodating vocal union leaders within State structures.
His removal now comes against the backdrop of deepening tensions between organised labour and the government over wages, delayed promotions, and persistent crises in the public health sector.
A nurse by training, Panyako has been the Secretary-General of the Kenya National Union of Nurses since 2013, a position from which he built a reputation as an unyielding negotiator. He has repeatedly taken on successive governments, accusing them of exploiting healthcare workers while presiding over a collapsing public health system. His confrontational style was most visible in 2020, when he led nationwide calls for nurses to strike after the Salaries and Remuneration Commission declared that the State could not meet their demands.
Beyond labour activism, Panyako has harboured clear political ambitions. He contested the Malava parliamentary seat in 2022 on a United Democratic Alliance ticket but lost to the late ANC MP Malulu Injendi. He challenged the outcome in court, a move that further entrenched his image as a combative political actor unwilling to retreat quietly. Following Injendi’s death, Panyako made another attempt at the seat in a by-election, only to suffer a second defeat.
His relationship with UDA has also been fraught. Despite campaigning for President William Ruto in Western Kenya, Panyako has publicly accused his own party of sidelining him once power was secured. At one point, he claimed he had been offered a Cabinet Secretary position, which he said he declined, arguing that his role as nurses’ union boss was “bigger than that of a CS.”
The revocation of his board appointment is likely to be interpreted by his supporters as political punishment rather than routine administrative housekeeping. To critics within government, Panyako has long represented an uncomfortable contradiction: a State appointee who remained openly hostile to government policy, regularly mobilising workers against the same system that had placed him on a public board.
As of now, Panyako has not publicly responded to the dismissal. Whether his removal signals a broader purge of outspoken unionists from government-linked positions or is merely an isolated decision remains to be seen. What is clear is that one of Kenya’s loudest labour voices has lost a foothold inside government, a development that may further harden his stance outside it.
