Court rules Ugandan students can rejoin Kenya law school

More than 50 law students from a Ugandan university will resume their courses at the Kenya School of Law after the High Court’s reversed a decision to deregister their institution.

The Council of Legal Education (CLE) removed Uganda Pentecostal University (UPU) from its list of recognised institutions in January, casting uncertainty on the diploma students’ fate.

The deregistration meant that the students, who graduated between 2012 and this year, had their admissions to the law school revoked.

The deregistration was a result of an inspection of UPU’s main campus in Fort Portal, Uganda whose findings declared the institution’s premises and teaching staff were not up to standard.

Justice Weldon Korir on Friday quashed Council of Legal Education’s revocation, arguing that the university was not given the findings of the inspection prior to the revocation.

The judge also faulted the regulator for failing to give the university an opportunity to correct the errors its law degree programme was found to have.

“UPU should have been asked to take corrective measures. Only after failing this should it have been asked to explain why it had not made the changes. I am convinced that an adverse decision was made against the university,” said Mr Justice Korir.

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The judge faulted Council of Legal Education for applying the law selectively in its revocation of UPU’s recognition, which he said made the inspection process illegal.

According to CLE-Kenya’s report which was provided to the court, UPU’s library, lecture rooms, and teaching staff were not equivalent to those approved by CLE. It, however, did not leave room for a review in future.

UPU accused the regulator of acting out of malice, as it was not given an opportunity to contradict any of the findings made during the inspection.

“CLE-Kenya acted irrationally and without regard to the principles applicable in its decision making process. They failed to provide any tangible evidence to us to support their decision to revoke their recognition of our law programme,” said Stephen Nzaku, UPU’s lawyer.

CLE had maintained that it acted within its mandate in revoking UPU’s recognition.