Reprieve for law students as new framework ends KSL training monopoly

• The Court of Appeal ruling established that the CLE holds the sole mandate to accredit and license institutions to offer the Advocates Training Programme (ATP).

Attorney General Dorcas Oduor during a past meeting in her office. PHOTO | COURTESY

The Council of Legal Education (CLE) has introduced a new framework ending an 18-year monopoly at the Kenya School of Law (KSL) on training advocates.

This comes after CLE introduced two regulatory frameworks: the Legal Education (Licensing and Quality Assurance) Regulations, 2026 and the Legal Education (Advocates Training Programme) Regulations.

The shift stems from a Court of Appeal ruling establishing that the CLE holds the sole mandate to accredit and license institutions to offer the Advocates Training Programme (ATP).

This will now allow all qualified public and private universities to apply for licensing to offer ATP training, ending KSL's exclusive domain over professional bar training.

Receiving the report on Wednesday, Attorney General Dorcas Oduor said that the uncertainty of transition to legal practice from university will be effectively cured by the move.

"That uncertainty cannot be allowed to become a feature of the legal education in Kenya," she said.

Echoing her remarks, Law Society of Kenya (LSK) president Charles Kanjama said that more lawyers will have more room to be trained and sufficiently serve the nation.

"There is room for many more lawyers to be trained and to become competent to defend the rights of Kenyans," Kanjama noted.

Institutions seeking to offer the ATP will now be required to pay an initial licensing fee of Ksh.5 million, with a mandatory renewal after every three years at the same cost to ensure sustained quality compliance.

To avoid overcrowding, lecture halls are capped at a maximum of 40 trainees per class.

Institutions must maintain a strict 1:10 instructor-to-trainee ratio and ensure at least three full-time faculty members are present.

Meanwhile, KSL has been granted a two-year grace period exempting it from these immediate accreditation rules.

After the period lapses, KSL must re-apply and meet the same standards required of all other institutions.

The move will now open up multiple training institutions across the country, directly reducing the backlog of law graduates waiting for admission into KSL.

Previously, every law graduate from both public and private universities across the country had to attend KSL, creating an overwhelming influx of students that severely strained KSL’s facilities and teaching capacity.

This became one of the reasons blamed for low pass rates, as students who failed were trapped in a costly cycle of paying mandatory fees of Ksh.10,000 per exam retake and Ksh.15,000 per paper for remarking.