A city businessman has gone to court seeking a ransom of Sh 10 million special damages incurred during the malicious prosecution without any probable cause.
Peter Kamau Ruhangi has filed a suit against the Attorney General, the DPP and the Chief Land Registrar intending to be compensated for unlawful arrest and detention and malicious prosecution without any reasonable cause.
According to the documents filed before court, Ruhangi is the rightful and legal owner of the plot L.R No. 27/326 located at Ridgeways along Kiambu road which he jointly owned together with George Maara and David Mburu Gitere.
He got the property as a result of a sub-division of the original mother plot L.R No. 27/8 which measured 21 acres and acquired it through his company Gumchem Limited.
The plot was sub-divided in the year 1999 after they get the approval by the the city council of Nairobi and the ministry of lands and settlement with the conditions among them 10% of the property be surrendered to the city council for public utility.
Ruhangi applied for the re-allocation of the plot reserved for public utility which is the subject plot L.R No. 27/326 vide a letter dated February 15, 2000.
There after the City Council sought the approval of the Commissioner of Lands for the re-allocation of the said plot to Ruhangi through a letter dated November 14, 2001, and the Commissioner of Lands approved the same through a letter to the Nairobi City Town Clerk dated December 5, 2001.
Back in the year 2010, a businessman Maina Wandere who trades as Wonderjoy Party World Limited bought some property bordering that of Ruhangi and similarly were a creation of a sub-division of the mother parcel of land No. L.R 27/8.
In utilizing his property, Maina Wandere would routinely hire out his property for functions like weddings and due to the increase in customers he approached Ruhangi to allow his guests to be parking their vehicles in his plot and he allowed the request for free.
Wandere had attempted to cojole Ruhangi to sell him the plot but they never reached to a conclusive deal.
In the year 2012, Ruhangi agreed to use his plot to secure a Sh 65 million loan from Paramount bank and due to the accumulation of outstanding rates of Sh 535,739, he requested the bank to clear the rates so the charge over the property could proceed to be registered in their favour and they obliged.
The bank released the loan to M/S King’ori Kariuki Co. Advocates representing Ruhangi since he intended to use the same to buy some property along Kangundo Road.
The deal however fell through but the advocates of the vendor after refusing to refund the money to Ruhangi’s lawyers and they reported the matter to the DCI headquarters and to the LSK Disciplinary Tribunal.
As a result of this , the bank announced the said plot for sale through a public auction since they needed the loan be repaid back.
Through his council Isaac Maina Wandera he presented it in court and he was issued with an ex-parte injunction to stop the auction by the bank and the matter is still pending before court.
In 2015, Ruhangi and his lawyers went on to report Wandera’s illegal occupation of his plot at Muthaiga Police Station where the OCS at the station advised him to report the matter to the DCIO Pangani police station and obeyed.
They later found out that the then Director of Criminal Investigations Mr. Ndegwa Muhoro had ordered that file to be brought to him personally at the DCI headquarters and caused the officer investigating the matter to be transferred from the station.
Muhoro actively hindered and interfered with the the Investigations in to the illegal occupation of Wandera’s property.
According to Ruhangi through his sworn affidavit, he stated that,
“Due to the pre-existing comradeship with Wandera with whom they hail from the same village and their business nexus, Muhoro indulgence in the matter messed everything in favour of his friend,” read part of the document.
On May 4, 2016 Ruhangi reported the irregular conduct of this case by Ndegwa Muhoro to the office of Inspector General and to the office of Ombudsman both of whom acknowledged receipt of the complaint but failed to take any action.
He also.reported the matter to the National Land Commission (NLC) who determined there exist no legal basis for 25 years Temporary Occupation Licenses (TOL) as the same are capped at nine months.
The NLC also expressed it’s concern that the TOL was issued whilst the property was already encumbered by a bank loan and as such the TOL was adverse to the interests of the charger.
Them NLC also confirmed that ideally land administration procedures prescribed that where county governments are unable or unwilling to utilize public utility land surrendered during sub-division, such land should revert back to the previous owner who surrendered the same free of cost.
Finally the NLC advised the county Government to cancel the TOL and revert the land back to Ruhangi but the county government refused to follow NLC’s determination.
The charge sheet which was produced before court and relied on by the prosecution does not identify the exact plot numbers nor the exact location of the property alleged to have been destroyed.
The Nairobi City County has failed to evict Wandera inspite of orders from National Land Commission (NLC), which have never been varied, appealed or set aside regardless of writing severally to the said Nairobi City County,
” I had made a request to the court for it to make a physical visit to the property before commencement of the hearings and personally inspect it to no avail,” read part of the affidavit.
The former investigating officer Inspector Kimengwa vide a letter dated September 6, 2016, to the court vehemently opposed the physical inspection by the court.
Moreover, that letter neither copied to Ruhangi nor his advocate and goes to show the malice and contempt with which the prosecution and the Investigation authorities have conducted this matter against Ruhangi.
On January 6, 2022 Ruhangi was acquitted of malicious preferred against him since the prosecution according to the court did not met the key ingredients for the offense.
He claims that Wandera yielded immense powers in the government of Uhuru Kenyatta where he used the police to snatch his hard earned property,
” He has been the sole supplier of tents, equipment and catering at events at State House,” quoted the affidavit.
He added that up to date in proving his affidavit Wandera runs a cafeteria at DCI headquarters due to his past connections with with the former DCI director Ndegwa Muhoro.
Due to stress on the matter and mental anguish, Ruhangi has been sick on risk that he might lose his hard earned property which currently valued at Sh one billion, and now he is calling for the court on his rescue to curtail abuse of power against the citizens who lack connections.
