The Employment and Labour Relations Court has rejected an application seeking to have Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Kenya jailed over an unpaid compensation award to a former embassy employee, ruling that diplomatic immunity bars the ambassador’s personal detention.
Justice Hellen Wasilwa, sitting in Nairobi, said the ambassador, Khalid bin Abdullah Al-Salman, could not be summoned for the purpose of being committed to civil jail over the decree issued against the Royal Saudi Arabia Embassy.
However, the judge upheld the validity of a 2019 judgment in favour of Abdikadir Mohamed Abdullahi, also known as Abdikadir Mohamed, saying it had not been appealed against.
“The issue then is about how to execute this judgment. Summoning an Ambassador to be placed in civil jail is out of the question and the issue of contempt cannot lie against the ambassador in person,” Justice Wasilwa ruled in her October 22 ruling.
The dispute dates back to 2014, when Abdullahi said the embassy unfairly terminated his employment after he raised concerns about unpaid salary arrears.
He subsequently filed a claim against the embassy in February 2015, seeking compensation for the termination of his employment.
In a judgment delivered on July 19, 2019, the court found that the termination was unfair, having been prompted by his complaint over salary arrears, which the embassy had acknowledged during the proceedings.
The court ordered the embassy to pay him $310,282 and Saudi riyals 54,000 by September 19, 2019.
It further directed that if payment was not made by that deadline, interest at 14 per cent per year would accrue from February 5, 2015, when the suit was filed, until the amount was paid in full.
The former employee was also awarded legal costs of Sh1,042,540.70.
According to court documents, Abdullahi’s lawyers extracted the decree on August 14, 2020, and served it, together with the judgment, on the embassy through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on October 28, 2020.
Abdullahi said the ministry’s Principal secretary confirmed in a letter dated March 13, 2023, that the decree had been forwarded to the embassy.
Despite these steps, he told the court, the money remained unpaid more than five years after the judgment.
In an application dated September 26, 2025, Abdullahi sought to have Ambassador Al-Salman summoned to explain why he should not be punished for allegedly disobeying the court’s orders.
He wanted the ambassador jailed for six months or for such period as the court considered appropriate. He also asked the court to order the seizure of embassy property as an alternative means of compelling compliance.
Abdullahi argued that the judgment remained binding and that the embassy had not obtained an order setting it aside or changing its terms.
He maintained that the court’s decisions could not be ignored simply because the respondent considered them legally flawed.
He further argued that the court had authority to hear an employment dispute involving a diplomatic mission because employment was a commercial relationship governed by Kenyan labour law.
The former employee also challenged the embassy’s response to his application, arguing that it had been sworn by its head of finance, Khalid M. H. Al-Arishi, rather than the ambassador against whom the contempt proceedings were directed.
But the embassy opposed the application, arguing that the original case had been brought against the wrong party and that the proposed action against the ambassador would violate diplomatic immunity.
In an affidavit sworn on March 2, 2026, Al-Arishi said the embassy was not a separate legal entity capable of being sued in its own name.
The embassy argued that the proper party should have been the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and that any proceedings against the foreign state had to comply with the applicable rules governing diplomatic immunity and service of court documents outside Kenya.
It also contended that the original judgment was invalid because the proceedings had been instituted against the embassy rather than the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
The mission warned that summoning or detaining the ambassador would violate international law and could trigger an avoidable diplomatic dispute between Kenya and Saudi Arabia.
It relied on the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, which protects diplomatic agents from arrest or detention and safeguards diplomatic mission premises against certain enforcement measures.
Justice Wasilwa, however, distinguished between the validity of the judgment and the manner in which it could be enforced.
She noted that the 2019 judgment had not been appealed against and rejected the embassy’s argument that it could simply be treated as invalid.
“The applicant has sought orders to summon the ambassador of Saudi Arabia in Kenya to answer to the decree pending before court,” the judge observed.
She said the central issue was how to enforce the award without violating the ambassador’s protection under diplomatic law.
The judge indicated that Abdullahi could have sought an order requiring the embassy to explain why the decree should not be enforced, instead of pursuing the ambassador’s arrest.
“The respondents know who is responsible to make good the decree and so it would have been reasonable to summon the respondent to show cause why execution should not issue as opposed to issuance of a warrant of arrest,” she said.
Justice Wasilwa consequently declined to grant the application. She made no order on costs, meaning each side will bear its own legal expenses for the application.
The ruling does not set aside the 2019 compensation award. It rejects the attempt to jail the ambassador personally and leaves the question of lawful enforcement of the judgment distinct from the original finding that Abdullahi’s dismissal was unfair.
