The High Court sitting in Nairobi on 30th September 2025 found Senior Counsel and former President of the Law Society of Kenya Nelson Havi of Havi & Company Advocates liable to pay tax arrears.
The dispute arose after the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) issued additional assessments against Havi & Company Advocates covering the period January 2015 to September 2023. KRA declined to issue Havi a Tax Compliance Certificate (TCC), citing unpaid income tax and VAT. Nelson Andayi Havi challenged the assessments before the Tax Appeals Tribunal (TAT), arguing that KRA’s decisions were inconsistent, time-barred under the Tax Procedures Act (TPA), and in some cases deemed allowed by law.
At the Tax Appeals Tribunal (TAT), the key issue was whether Havi’s objections were lodged within statutory timelines under Section 51 of the TPA. The Tribunal held on January 12, 2025, that Havi failed to object to tax decisions of February 2021 within the 30-day window. Later objections filed in April and May 2021 were found to be time-barred.
Similarly, responses filed in May and July 2022 were deemed invalid for lateness. Consequently, the Tribunal ruled that KRA’s demand notices, agency notices, adjustments to self-assessments, and refusal to issue a TCC were not appealable decisions. Finding that it lacked jurisdiction, the TAT struck out Havi’s appeal.
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Dissatisfied, Havi appealed to the High Court on 14 grounds, challenging both the Tribunal’s judgment and KRA’s assessments. He argued that the Tribunal wrongly upheld KRA’s position without interrogating whether objections were validly determined.
The High Court isolated four issues: the competence of Havi’s TAT appeal, whether objections to the February 2021 and April 2022 decisions were valid, whether subsequent KRA decisions between August and October 2023 were appealable, and the status of an objection lodged on October 3, 2024.
In a carefully reasoned judgment, the court drew a firm line on the statutory powers vested in KRA. First, the court acknowledged that the Appeal filed by Havi was competent. The Court further found that despite the Senior Counsel being granted an opportunity to lodge a late objection by 22nd June 2022, Havi lodged his objection on 19th July 2022 that was found to be irregular and time-barred.
In arriving at this decision, the court stated as follows: ‘In short, the court cannot be called upon to enforce an act which is a nullity, since it is void and every proceeding founded on it is also in law a nullity.”
Based on the foregoing, the demands and assessments for the period January 2015 to October 2023 were found to be valid and the tax arrears due payable by the Senior Counsel.
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