The Employment and Labor Relations Court has said it has jurisdiction to determine a case lodged by Facebook content moderators challenging their unlawful and unfair termination.
Justice Nduma Nderi said it is immaterial whether the alleged violations occurred in physical or virtual space within the jurisdiction of this Court in Kenya.
Meta Platforms and Meta Platforms Ireland Limited had argued that they are foreign corporations who are neither formally present, domiciled nor trading in Kenya and the Kenyan court cannot assume jurisdiction on that ground.
“As there is no employer-employee relationship between the Petitioners and us, this court lacks jurisdiction over any purported dispute,” they told the judge.
But Nderi said the two have rightly been placed within the territorial jurisdiction of the Court to enable them to defend the case brought against them by the petitioners.
The moderators filed the case in court and obtained orders to stop their mass sacking.
They told the court that they were engaged by Meta Platforms, Inc, and Meta Platforms Ireland Limited to work in Kenya.
The recruitment was done through Sama Source Kenya EPZ Limited.
Nderi in stopping the sacking last month also stopped Meta Platforms, INC Meta Platforms Ireland Limited, and Samasource Kenya EPZ Limited from varying the contractual terms of Facebook content moderators in a manner unfavourable to them pending the hearing of the application.
On Thursday, he extended those orders and directed the matter be referred to the Principal Judge to allocate the matter to another judge within the Judicial Review and Labour Relations Division to hear and determine the pending applications.
