Judiciary defends City Hall shutdown

The Judiciary has defended its decision to cease operations at City Hall, Nairobi, arguing it is within the law, even as the fate of petty city offenders remains in the balance.

This stalemate is likely to spill over to other counties as the judiciary wades into the matter in a move likely to cause an impasse.
 
The decision has severely affected law enforcement in Nairobi County for three days running, stirring a standoff between the city prosecution team and the judiciary over the transfer of cases from the city courts to Milimani courts.
 
In its defense, however, the judiciary maintained it was bound by the law, and that “recent directive on the initiation of cases at the court that has been operating at City Hall must be seen in this light”.
 
At the centre of the dispute is a revenue-sharing formula between the county and the judiciary.
 
The tension between the two institutions dates back to 2016 when the county and the Judiciary agreed on modalities for sharing the revenue collected by the City Courts, which has not been implemented for years.
 
The sweeping move left the municipal prosecution team jobless as the effected changes required all cases to be transferred to Milimani courts.
 
“The judiciary will continue to collect fines arising from the enforcement of county legislation and remit the same to national treasury until a legal framework requiring the fines to be applied differently is enacted,” chief registrar of the judiciary Anne Amadi said.
 
However, the counties are now accusing the judiciary of trying to implement the agreement, which was not clear, and has faced several challenges since 2016.
 
The City Magistrate Leah Gichera in a September 28 notice said that as of October 2, ‘all pleas will be registered at the Milimani Law Courts County Registry’. 

The move was, however, opposed by the public prosecutor's office which accused the magistrate of implementing the changes without consulting them.
 
"County pleas will now be taken by the County Magistrate Pleas Court No.23 Milimani Law Courts. Cash bail and fines will be paid at the Milimani Law Courts upon issuance of an invoice at the Milimani Law Courts County Registry counter," the magistrate said in a notice posted on the notice board.
 
With this directive, the fate of the city court was sealed. And now, the judiciary position cements the decision.
 
“We are in dialogue with numerous counties on the implementation of this memorandum of understanding which remains in force,” the chief registrar of the judiciary said, referring to an MoU between the judiciary and the council of governors (CoG) which she said is “committed to overseeing the transition from local authority courts dealing with county matters”.

realign the system
 
To realign the system of local authorities that existed before the promulgation of the constitution in 2010 which birthed the devolved unit, parliament enacted the County Governments Act which repealed the Local Governments Act, Ms Amadi explained.
 
“Noting the significance of these and other changes touching on the administration of justice and the need for collaboration in their implementation,” Ms Amadi said, “the CoG signed an MoU with the judiciary and other agencies involved in the administration of justice in March 2016, with a shared commitment to expand access to justice within the context of the constitution.”
 
The County Attorney Christine Ireri, however, said that although City Hall and the Judiciary had agreed on how to share revenue, a clear plan was still needed, which was why implementation was taking so long.
 
Ms Ireri who lamented that there was no clarity on how petty cases will be transferred to Milimani courts and how fines will be collected told the Nation that offenders arrested on Friday had to be released for lack of a magistrate.