Kenya Law Reports online Case Search now absolutely free!

 Kenya Law Reports has waived the subscription fee for its Case Search service thus providing free user access to East Africa’s most comprehensive case law database. Hitherto, all other legal information on the Kenya Law Reports website had been provided for free, with the exception of the Case Search service which remained a premium subscribers-only product.

The announcement, which came into effect in September 2007, underlines Kenya Law Report’s embracing of the ideal of providing free access to public information. Further, it is a practical step towards enabling the Kenya Law Reports to join the burgeoning Free Access to Law Movement by establishing itself as a Legal Information Institute (LII). (For more in formation on the Movement, see http://www.worldlii.org/ )

This development is the culmination of a series of events which began with the Hon. Mr. Justice J.E. Gicheru, Chief Justice and Chairman of the National Council for Law Reporting joining the membership of the Southern African Judges Commission (SAJC). The SAJC agreed to the online publication of the decisions of its member courts by the Southern African Legal Information Institute (SAFLII - http://www.saflii.org/ ).

SAFLII is a non-governmental organization that promotes free access to law and its main objectives are to promote justice and the rule of law, web-based access to regional law, legal education and research and transparency yin the judiciary. SAFLII is a signatory to the Montreal Declaration n Free Access to Law, 2002.

SAFLII identified the potential for Kenya Law Reports as an ideal African model of a Legal Information Institute and entered into discussions with it with a view to welcoming it into the fraternity of Legal Information Institutes. In the partnership that followed, both organizations realized mutually beneficial outcomes for their online legal researchers and for the greater Free Access to Law Movement. Kenya Law Reports acquired the technical and administrative know how to set up both a local and a regional chapter of the Legal Information Institute. Thus were the Kenya Legal Information Institute (KENLII) and the East Africa Legal Information Institute (EALII) conceived. SAFLII, on the other hand, as indeed all other Institutes, will be able to provide its users with a window into Kenya Law Reports’ website from which legal information will be easily accessed.

Kenya Law Reports remains committed not only to providing the latest and the most relevant case law and other legal information but to also continually improving on the diversity and content of its products for the benefit of all its users.