Auditor General Nancy Gathungu has raised concerns over huge pending legal bills amounting to billions Nairobi County owes lawyers.

In a report by Gathungu, it has been revealed that the Governor Johnson Sakaja-led administration out of a legal list of 832 cases, the county owes 11 advocates more than Sh10 billion.

“Analysis of the revenue against the legal fees revealed that 11 advocates out of a legal list of 832 cases, are owed a total of Sh10,741,451,631,” the report.

This is contained in the report of the Auditor General on County Executive on Nairobi for the Financial Year that ended on June 30, 2023. Alarmingly, the legal fees owed the 11 lawyers exceed Sh10.6 billion, which is Nairobi’s own source revenue.

More shocking is that the same 11 lawyers represent 50 per cent of the legal pending bills, while a further 121 lawyers are owed Sh10.2 billion. Payment of legal fees has been a thorn in the flesh for previous administrations at City Hall.

Nairobi County owes contractors and suppliers more than Sh100 billion in pending bills.
Many are however asking why City Hall prioritised the payment to the legal firms while other bills are long overdue.

In January 2022, Governor Johnson Sakaja appointed a 12-member committee to review and verify the Sh2.1 billion legal services pending bills owed by the county.

Fresh licences

Committee on the Review, Scrutiny and Verification of Pending Legal Bills is led by Advocate Kamotho Waiganjo as the chairperson and Sylvia Kassanga as vice-chairperson.

On June 27, 2023 , the Controller of Budgets Margaret Nyakang’o declined a request by City Hall to approve Sh1.3 billion to pay legal firms for services provided. Instead, she demanded various clarifications on the requisitions.

The CoB said given the schedule of 19 firms to be paid does not include the invoices’ dates and therefore, it is difficult to ascertain whether they are pending bills or related to works done and invoiced in the current Financial year.

“Please, therefore, revise the schedule to include the date of the invoices and attached copies of the payment vouchers for the 19 firms,” she said in a letter to CEC in charge of Finance and Economic Planning Charles Kerich dated June 27.

“Please provide clarifications on the above issues to enable my office to facilitate the requisitions soonest.”

City Hall had sought CoB approval to release the money. However, the county had not provided the Pending Bills Payment Plan which could enable the matching of individual payees to the requisition.

“Further, it is difficult to match the proposed payments with the Pending Bills Report earlier presented to this office,” the letter.