In his quest to return the management of the Kenya Ferry Services (KFS) to the County government, Mombasa Governor Ali Hassan Joho has filed a case to the Supreme Court.
This is after the Court of Appeal ruled that operations at KFS should be under the national government.
The dispute over management of ferry services started in February 2016 when the county government of Mombasa took over the running of the ferry and started collecting revenue saying it is a devolved function.
The move saw KFS quickly run to court, after which the High Court in Mombasa asked Joho's administration to return ferry services to the national government in November 2016.
According to the two courts, the Likoni Ferry Channel is not an inland lake but is part of international waterways assigned to the National government.
Joho later appealed the decision but lost the case once again, hence the decision to seek Supreme Court's intervention.
Through lawyer Paul Mwangi, Joho argues that the appellate court relied on unconstitutional and extraneous issues to deny the county opportunity to collect revenue from a facility that falls within its jurisdiction.
"Unless the Supreme Court intervenes, the people of Mombasa will not benefit from their own facility. The appellate court made a mistake by failing to appreciate the roles of the two levels of government in managing resources that have been devolved," he said.
“They contradicted themselves by ruling that Kenya Ferry Services are entitled to collect revenues from managing the parking bays on either side of the water channel but that they must first obtain licence from the county government,” added Mwangi as reported by the Standard.