Manchester firm to lead second wave of Mau Mau litigation

Manchester personal injury specialists Tandem Law has been appointed lead solicitors under a group litigation order to bring over 8,000 torture, detention and mistreatment claims against the British government.

The firm, which has offices in Preston and Manchester, was acquired from administration by Antony Hodari in May this year.

The claims date back to the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya, and follow foreign secretary William Hague's announcement in June that the British government had agreed to pay £19.9m in damages and costs to settle the first wave of claims, brought by Leigh Day & Co.

The High Court ruled in October 2012 that although around 50 years had elapsed since the limitation period ended in the Mau Mau cases, the claims should be allowed to proceed using the discretion given to the court under Section 33 of the Limitation Act 1980.

A spokeswoman for Tandem Law said the latest claims would go through the same process as the earlier ones, but they were the first to be dealt with by a group litigation order.

"The firm believe their heads of claim go wider than Leigh Day's and there are probably more serious matters involved," she said. "Claimants must be first generation actual victims rather than relatives."

Following confirmation of the group litigation order, Tandem Law will advertise in the British and Kenyan media to enable new claimants and their solicitors to come forward and register their claims by 30 April 2014. Those who miss the deadline will need the court's permission to register.

Claimants must have "suffered some form of mistreatment" between October 1952 and 12 December 1963.

Tandem Law is working with Cecil Miller Advocates in Nairobi on the cases, while other law firms in the UK, GT Law and Knights Law, are understood to have hundreds more cases.