The High Court has struck a hammer blow to the Executive, declaring the appointment of 21 advisors to President William Ruto as unconstitutional, null, and void. In a scathing ruling, Justice Bahati Mwamuye termed the offices "wasteful, opaque, and irregular."

The verdict effectively renders the 21 advisors jobless and bars the government from paying them a single shilling in salaries or allowances. The ruling is a major victory for the Katiba Institute, which filed the petition arguing that the President had bypassed the Public Service Commission (PSC) and the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) in creating the positions.

"The Cart Before the Horse"

Justice Mwamuye's judgment dissected the appointment process with surgical precision. He noted that the Executive had identified individuals for the roles—including prominent economist David Ndii and former Solicitor-General Kennedy Ogeto—before the offices were even legally established.

• Bypassed Process: The court found no evidence of competitive recruitment or public participation.
• Fiscal Irresponsibility: The SRC was not consulted on the financial implications of the new offices, violating principles of prudent financial management.
• Ghost Approvals: The PSC's "approval" letters were found to be brief and lacking in any substantive analysis of the need for the roles.

"A parallel, unregulated, and perhaps unnecessary advisory structure... offends the very heart of the constitutional ethos," Justice Mwamuye ruled. He ordered the PSC to conduct an immediate audit of all offices established in the Executive Office of the President since 2010 to weed out further irregularities.

The ruling is a significant setback for the President's "Broad-Based Government" strategy, which had used these advisory roles to accommodate political allies and technocrats. For the 21 affected individuals, the party is over; for the taxpayer, it is a rare moment of relief from the burden of a bloated wage bill.