Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja has refuted claims of paying out Ksh10 billion to various law firms as legal fees.
In a statement dated April 11, Sakaja clarified that the county government had only paid Ksh287 million.
He added that the Ksh10 billion that is pending to be paid to various law firms was not incurred during his tenure but during the term of his predecessors.
Meanwhile, he revealed that this government had already initiated an audit of the pending bills adding that some of the legal fees that the law firms were demanding had been reduced significantly.
Sakaja expressed that the exercise was still ongoing maintaining that city residents would get value for their money once the process was completed.
"Before I came into office, all civil cases were handled by external advocates. Presently, a total number of 72 cases out of the 827 active cases are being handled by our internal counsel. To address the problem of huge pending bills in unpaid legal fees, I directed the County Attorney to appoint a Legal fee assessment committee composed of 5 advocates.
"The committee has so far reviewed 44 fee notes and the process is still ongoing. The initial demanded amount in the 44 matters that had previously been assessed by an individual was Ksh5,112,019,527. After reassessment, The amount now stands at Ksh2,399,655,042, therefore, saving the County Government a total of Ksh2,712,364,485.
However, he also expressed that the county government could not continue depending on external law firms to represent the county in court adding that they will be hiring lawyers for the country to undertake that exercise.
Sakaja added that they would be working with the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) to ensure that the lawyers are properly renumerated so that their position can attract many lawyers.
"During the 19th County Executive meeting, approval was granted for the restructuring of the office of the County Attorney's office to expand the staffing levels.
"50 lawyers will be employed to boost internal capacity with a view of handling all legal matters internally and saving costs incurred from engaging external counsel," he added.
Meanwhile, the governor noted that they would work to also recoup Ksh100 million that was awarded to them in various court cases.
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