The Judiciary on June 16 notified Kenyans that citizens in Nairobi will from July 1, 2020, only be allowed to file their court cases online in Nairobi.
INTRODUCTION OF ELECTRONIC-FILING OF CASES IN NAIROBI COURTS pic.twitter.com/seXlR865pK
— David Maraga (@dkmaraga) June 16, 2020
This will be enabled by the new Electronic Filing System (e-filing).
E-Filing: How to file cases online
To be able to do this some parties will be required to register themselves through the e-filing court platform.
This is in order to be able to log into the Judiciary System. These parties include:
- Law Society of Kenya (LSK) Members
- Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions
- Police
- Members of the Public
After you visit the page and choose either, Law Firm, Organization or Individual then;
- Fill in all your details
- Activate your account: You will probably get it in spam email
- Update your account details and you are in
From here, you will be able to upload documents, asses court fees and submit files to the registry all online.
The statement says that as long as your device is able to attach files and access the internet, you should be good to go. This means you can use your phone, tablet, laptop or computer.
Filing a case
To file a case you will need to;
- Click on file new case
- Correctly enter the details of the parties and then click next
- Ensure that each document is scanned separately and correctly labelled
- Choose the name of the document to be uploaded from the drop-down menu and attach the document from the storage location (flash disc/ hard drive)
- Upload the document into the e-filing system
- Pay the correct amount assessed using the MPESA Paybill Number 553388 and the Unique Account Number indicated on the Invoice (Starting with letter “E”)
- Once you receive a confirmation message from KCB, the system will auto-generate a case number
- Write the generated case number on your documents.
- Print the Electronic Receipt and keep it for future court visit to enable the cashier give you an official receipt and subsequent stamping of your documents.
This comes at a time when courts are increasingly using ICT to perform various court-based activities including using Zoom to spin the wheel of Justice.
As of May 2020, the Judiciary had delivered approximately 7,000 judgments since the online court operations started due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Chief Justice David Maraga said that the use of technology has proved invaluable in the dispensation of justice in the country.
“The use of technology in dispensation of justice has since proved an invaluable channel, through which we can carry out operations in the justice 4 sector during this period of scaled-down court operations,” CJ Maraga said.
