Blow to lawyers as Uhuru bans external legal services

A recent presidential directive that ministries, state agencies and institutions should not hire private lawyers to prosecute their matters in court will deal a financial blow to advocates.

President Uhuru Kenyatta ordered the Cabinet secretaries, CASs and Principal secretaries to utilise the office of the Attorney General to resolve legal issues. 

The President, who was addressing the 85 top government officials virtually a fortnight ago, also directed state agencies and public institutions that have filed court cases against one another to withdraw them within seven days.

Several reports by the Auditor General and the Controller of Budget have exposed how some of the parastatals swindle taxpayers by inflating the legal fees.

The two watchdog institutions have year in, year out flagged ineligible bills that ministries and their agencies cannot authenticate either due to lack of supporting documents, fraud, exaggeration or service provided.

Already, Education CS George Magoha has directed public universities, teacher training colleges, regional and county directors of education and CEOs of agencies under his ministry to terminate the services of advocates they had hired without the authority of AG Paul Kariuki.

“State agencies and institutions shall not engage and or contract external counsel without the written approval of the Attorney General ... and shall terminate within 14 days engagement with external advocates who had been contracted without express and prior grant from the AG,” Magoha says in a July 14 memo highlighting the resolutions of the virtual meeting.

The Star has established that all the CSs have also dispatched the same directive to their respective line parastatals, agencies and institutions.

Just after the 2017 General Election, the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission spent Sh859 million on lawyers who represented it in various court battles.

Months to the 2017 General Election, the IEBC was embroiled in protracted legal battles with the Nasa opposition that peaked with the twin presidential poll petitions.

Some law firms have also been hired by some parastatals to pursue land titles for their various parcels across the country. In 2018, the National Assembly’s Public Investments Committee was told how it had taken some firms up to 25 years to secure a single title, despite billing the government huge amounts of cash.

On Monday, Nairobi Law Society of Kenya branch chairman Erick Theuri said they will be moving to court to challenge the directive.

Theuri, who spoke to the Star by phone, noted that the directive is unconstitutional since there is the Public Procurement Act that guides the ministries, independent commissions, agencies and institutions on procurement.

“Why only legal services? The parastatals, agencies and institutions are procuring other services. There is mischief in this move and we will not accept it,” he said.

He said the directive is part of the wider scheme by the Office of the President and the AG to retaliate after the LSK criticised Uhuru and Kariuki for not adhering to the rule of law and disobeying court orders.

He said with the directive that the Office of the AG must approve the contract prior to signing, it could be manipulated to favour certain law firms.

“This is just but a hit back by the AG because there is a censure motion that has been filed at LSK seeking to expel him from the LSK. The AG wants to roll back the constitutional provisions from the current transparent and lawful process to an opaque one and this is a contempt to a court ruling.” 

Theuri added, “This is meant to entrench the culture of impunity and bid rigging. The AG should step back and stop this assault on lawyers. If there are problems, they should be resolved amicably just as he moved to court to challenge the censure motion.”

The LSK has accused the President of disobeying court orders, misrule and leading the country to dictatorship.       

- mwaniki fm