City Hall, the Nairobi City County headquarters.
In August 2021, over Gikomba 900 traders moved a petition to the High Court seeking Sh20 billion in compensation from City Hall. The county government deployed five different law firms to defend it.
Four of the five law firms raised their respective fee notes totalling Sh3.5 billion as follows: Three raised a fee note of Sh3 billion made up of Sh1 billion each while the fourth raised Sh40 million. City Hall paid one of the law firms Sh1 billion as well as the one with Sh40 million.
In a separate case in 2018, Nairobi Beach Club sued Nairobi County government over a decision to increase monthly rent for a tenant who owned a restaurant from Sh20,000 to Sh60,000. City Hall instructed a lawyer to defend the county against the claim.
The lawyer raised a fee note of Sh105 million, which was reviewed downwards to Sh50 million. The county paid Sh20 million to the lawyer with a promise to clear the balance.
This was just the tip of the iceberg on the apparent collusion between officials at the Nairobi City County government and law firms to siphon billions of taxpayer resources.
The details are contained in an interim report by a 14-member committee appointed by Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja in January 2023.
According to the report, there was no criteria listed on what amount was to be charged on the specific cases.
“This leaves one wondering what parameters were used to approve a fee note of over a billion shillings for one lawyer and another at 40 million (reduced from 42 million) for another in the same matter. This arbitrariness in the determination of fees is replicated in numerous other files,” read the report seen by Nation.Africa.
The report lays bare the goings-on at City Hall where a few chosen lawyers represent less than 10 percent of the county’s litigation business. In some instances, the findings indicate that certain lawyers would receive pleadings from lawyers who have sued the county and would write to the county legal department soliciting for instructions.
In the majority of the cases, several firms are instructed to represent the county in the same matter, leading to double payment of fees while in some cases, instructions were withdrawn from lawyers who proposed lower fees and issued to lawyers charging more exorbitant rates.
Mr Sakaja failed to make the findings of the committee public despite receiving the findings together with a list of law firms recommended by the committee to receive payment.
The 14-member committee resigned hurriedly in June last year to protest over a decision by the county to pay outside what they had recommended and difficult working conditions. City Hall has since appointed a separate committee made up of five advocates to review the legal pending bills.
The members of the previous committee also claim the county failed to pay them their allowances for the six months that they worked in the committee.
“We were just used as a rubber stamp and there were so many [vested] interests members had to quit. The county government went ahead and made a payment outside recommendations of the committee and this demoralised members,” a committee member told Nation.Africa.
The payment of law firms at City Hall caught the attention of the country in July last year after the Controller of Budget flagged a planned payment of Sh1.4 billion to law firms using fake invoices and the lack of supporting documents by the county administration.
Separately, a case was filed at the High Court over a decision by the county government to pay 15 law firms an amount totalling Sh2.1 billion in pending bills over concerns about the modality used to identify the law firms. This was after the county government ignored a list of law firms put forward by the committee for payment.
A former county attorney Ms Lydia Kwamboka was also shown the door last year by the Sakaja-led administration following the controversy surrounding payment. Ms Kwamboka had a few days before her firing appeared before the Nairobi City County Assembly’s legal committee.
The revelations come amidst concerns that City Hall is battling legal pending bills of Sh21 billion according to the auditor general’s report for the year ended June 2023. The report reveals that just 11 advocates out of the legal list of 832 cases are owed a total of Sh10.7 billion, an amount that the auditor general indicates is more than the county’s own revenue collection.
Mr Sakaja has, however, moved to defend the county insisting that the county government has made a payment of Sh287 million payment to different law firms and is currently working to reduce the problem of the huge pending bills.
“To address the problem of huge pending bills in unpaid legal fees, I directed the County Attorney to appoint a legal fees assessment committee composed of five advocates. The committee has so far reviewed 44 fee notes. The process is ongoing.”
The county government is also moving away from reliance on external advocates to build its own capacity. So far, Mr Sakaja says, the county plans to employ 50 lawyers who will represent it in various cases.
