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AG Oduor alleges ‘vexatious’ cases in rising public interest litigations against State
Attorney General Dorcas Oduor addresses journalists during the unveiling of the Government Critical Litigation and Loss Mitigation Review Committee on May 29, 2025 at the State Law Office in Nairobi.
Attorney-General Dorcas Oduor has decried increased public interest litigation cases against the government, saying some of them are vexatious.
Ms Oduor said that although it is a right to hold the government to account and that it is within the rule of law that people must have an avenue in which they can fault an act of the executive, some of the cases are filed with ill motives.
“I agree it is a right to hold the government to account; however, some of the cases are vexatious litigation”, said Ms Oduor.
According to the AG, some people file cases against the government with almost 10 respondents, then within two weeks, they seek to withdraw them and do not want them resolved to the end.
“They come and say they want to negotiate even before the cases are heard, there are those cases when you look at it, are more than about public interest,” said Ms Oduor.
Ms Oduor made the remarks during the Law Society of Kenya (LSK) annual conference at Diamonds Leisure Beach & Golf Resort in Diani, Kwale County.
The AG acknowledged that the government owes lawyers and their clients a lot of money in legal fees and compensation claims and that some of the cases have gone up to the Supreme Court.
She said that some of the claims are almost 20 years old and that it is very difficult for her office to deal with them.
“Even when you are writing to tell me the government owes me this much, all I can do is to tell the ministries that you have this judgment against you, what can you do about it? Every time they are telling me they do not have budgetary allocations,” said Ms Oduor.
She added that in some instances, some of the ministries whose claims are against them might have been merged and others dissolved.
The AG, who urged the lawyers to bear with her office over the situation, said that she intends to take account of all the cases and put them on a cabinet memo and try to engage on how to deal with them.
“If it (claim) is more than two years we took it to the pending bills, even with the pending bills committee we want to deal with this issue of money owed to you and your clients by the government, it is not very easy,” said Ms Oduor.
At the same time, the AG raised concerns about the quality, transparency and accountability of the Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) mechanism they have adopted in dealing with complaints against lawyers.
“I know ADR is good, but look at it, you have held this person’s money for about five years, you tell them to do away with interest...you call that ADR, is that fair? let us work with transparency in ADR as we embrace it,” Ms Oduor told the lawyers.
Over 1,500 lawyers are currently attending their annual conference with this year’s theme being ‘Protecting Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law-Ensuring Accountability’.
LSK President Faith Odhiambo said that as a society, they have improved ties with their colleagues from the region through their bar associations and have cordial relationship.
However, she said that they still have challenges in having LSK members practice in neighboring countries such as Uganda and Tanzania and that even in Burundi and Rwanda Swahili language has not been adopted in court.
“We had engaged our members in public participation and they rejected opening borders (for other lawyers in the region to practice in the country) if there is no reciprocity,” said Ms Odhiambo.
She said that LSK is open to support their East Africa region colleagues wherever there are issues, but that it is high time for the legal space to have reciprocity.
Ms Odhiambo told the AG to engage her counterparts in Uganda and Tanzania, saying it was high time she urged them to ensure that there is fair practice in that as LSK admits advocates from their countries, they should also admit Kenyans.
“I can tell you for a fact not even one Kenyan practices in Tanzania, at least because of good relationship with Uganda you can get a temporary certificate, but in Tanzania you cannot get to step into court,” said Ms Odhiambo.
