Efforts by the government to continue collecting the housing levy from employees suffered a setback after the court of appeal suspended the deductions.
A three judge bench constituting Justices Joyce Achode, John Mativo and Mwaniki Gachoka, ruled that the levy remains suspended as directed by the High Court.
In their decision, the judges said the application by the government to have a stay order on the High Court judgment on affordable housing lacked merit arguing that public interest tilts in favour of not granting the stay or the suspension sought.
“The question that begs an answer is whether in the circumstances of this case it would be in public interest to grant a stay whose effect is to allow a statute that has been found to be constitutionally infirm to continue being in the law books pending the hearing of an appeal. We do not think so.” Submitted the Judges.
The court argued that public interest favored not granting the stay or the suspension sought awaiting the determination of the issues raised in the intended appeals.
The court had granted the government a window to continue deducting the charges until today when the court was to issue further directions on the matter.
In the January 3rd decision, the Court of Appeal had granted the government the status quo to continue collecting the levies after the state argued that failing to award the stay order would have devastating consequences on state plans.
In its judgment delivered on November 28th last year, the High Court had declared the levy unconstitutional arguing that it was discriminatory as it was introduced without a legal framework and was only targeting a section of Kenyans.
