Nairobi Governor Johson Sakaja has responded to reports stating that the county spent Ksh10 billion on lawyers in the 2022/2023 financial year.
In an interview on Citizen TV, Sakaja dismissed the reports on social media as fake stating the amount in question is too much to be spent on legal fees.
He explained that Nairobi paid Ksh287 million to lawyers as opposed to the reports by the media.
“I have seen fake media reports that the Auditor General said Nairobi paid KSh.10B to lawyers. That is not true; it’s impossible. We would not be able to pay salaries,” Sakaja said.
“We have not paid Ksh10 billion to lawyers, the amount of money we paid Ksh287 million.”
The Governor revealed that his administration found a pending bill of Ksh21 billion in legal fees when he took over office in 2022.
Sakaja said the amount was unattainable hence he formed a task force to address the issue.
However, the task force was later declared unconstitutional by a court ruling, hence stopping its operations.
“When I got into office, I found legal pending bill of Ksh21 billion owed to lawyers. This was more than twice our own source revenue and equitable share revenue. We set up a task force in January 2023 led by advocate Kamotho Waiganjo to look into the matter, but it was banned by a court ruling in Trans Nzoia,” he said.
Sakaja said his internal team looked at 44 cases amounting to Ksh5.2 billion and was able to bring the figure down to Ksh2.3 billion.
He further stated that the county has created an establishment of 50 advocates to advise the different sectors to reduce the number of court cases.
According to Sakaja, many of the said cases should be in court and the lawyers are demanding for crazy amounts.
Also Read: Sakaja Under Fire Over Ksh10.7 Billion Arrears Owed to 11 Lawyers
Sakaja Comments on Nairobi Pay
Sakaja also defended the Nairobi Revenue Services (NRS) arguing that it was set up by the national government when the county functions were transferred to the Nairobi Metropolitan Service (NMS).
“At that time the responsibility to collect revenue had been transferred to KRA and they did not have a system, so they used this system. The system was developed by the government, there is no company called Nairobi. Infact, I came up with the brand name, the provider is the ministry of ICT,” he said.
Also Read: Senate Orders for the Arrest of Governor Johnson Sakaja
He explained that the county opted to adopt the system since the government had spent a lot of resources to establish it.
The Nairobi Governor spoke against the backdrop of concerns raised about irregularities detailed in the Auditor General’s report.
Sakaja was also on the spot over his repetitive failure to appear before the Senate to answer to summons by members of oversight committees.
However, the Governor has maintained that his absence was justifiable and that he was ready to respond to questions regarding transparency in the county dealings.
