High Court declares NMS unconstitutional following a petition filed by Law Society of Kenya

On Friday June 11th, High Court Judge James Makau said that President Kenyatta made a mistake in altering government structure under Executive Order No 1 of 2020.

The court declared that the deed of transfer of functions executed between the National government and the Nairobi Government as unconstitutional and unlawful.

The Law Society of Kenya (LSK) had in 2020 filed a petition arguing that Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS) was not a body established or recognized in law.

On June 18, 2020, High Court Judge Hellen Wasilwa ruled that the constitution of NMS was illegal and unconstitutional in response to a case filed by activist Okiya Omtatah.

Judge Wasilwa directed NMS to rectify the illegality within 90 days but revised the ruling days later saying the body was properly constituted.

This comes after the NMS administrative team confirmed a breach on its online system.

NMS Deputy Director-General Kang’ethe Thuku confirmed that hackers infiltrated the e-construction portal and conducted numerous illegal building plan approvals.

“We discovered that the e-construction system was recently hacked into and we have stopped using that system for the time being as we look for a solution,” Thuku conveyed.

High Court’s shocker to Uhuru

The High Court on Thursday, June 10, declared President Uhuru Kenyatta’s notice aimed at including the Judicial Service Commission and Judiciary under the Executive unconstitutional.

The Executive Order 1 of 2020 would have placed the Judiciary, commissions and independent offices under ministries and government departments.

The LSK, which had filed the petition, told the court that the Executive cannot restructure or assign functions to other arms and independent commissions.