Why won’t these two senior most officers in their respective departments deal with this matter with finality?
Recently, a video message from businessman Paul Kobia made rounds of social-media, where the controversial businessman was warning Jomo Gecaga to stop misleading the President as regards to matters pertaining to Meru politics. Apparently, Jomo Gecaga with his fake British accent acquired from the St. Mary’s School of Corruption, had barred Kobia access to Statehouse.
Jomo Gecaga has been romantically-linked to home wrecker Nyokabi Kamotho, daughter of late KANU bootlicker Joseph Kamotho. She was recently in the news, after being busted in a Nairobi lodging, with the husband of former screen siren and top news anchor Nyatichi Nyasani’s husband, Mr. Sitati.
Fresh from wrecking Nyatichi Nyasani’s home, she has set her sights on Jomo Gecaga, who has been doing her dirty work, by intimidating state officials and constitutional office-holders, from dispensing their duties.
A Thika family is living in absolute terror after receiving a series of phone threats to their lives, from a shadowy group of individuals and police officers with whom they have differed for over a decade about the ownership of land in the town.
The threats appear to be in reaction to a letter from ODPP to Thika DCIO directing him to forward the entire investigation file for a criminal case targeting the said family with regards to their ownership and occupancy of the land in question.
To underscore the level of impunity, not only did these characters orchestrate the sending of the threats, they have also ensured that the requested files NEVER reach the complaints department of the Office of Director of Prosecutions (ODPP).
The land dispute that has generated this level of hatred and threats pits a Thika family against the might and influence of the family of the Late JJ Kamotho, a much-reviled and ruthless political figure from Muranga County.
Anyone who has taken such threats lightly with regards to land matters in Thika in the recent past, has found themselves at a terrible end.
Infact, President Uhuru Kenyatta himself has had to intervene twice on high profile criminal matters which were then being mishandled by Thika CID.
The first was with regard to the collapse and death of former Juja MP and Parliamentary whip Hon. George Thuo at Porkies Bar in 2013. The initial CID investigators so bungled the investigation that they had to be sent on leave to allow a fresh lot of detectives from CID HQs to take up the case.
The 2nd and more high profile Presidential intervention was into the Kihiu Mwiri land fiasco, where 11 Directors of the giant land owning company had been assassinated or disappeared without a trace, to date.
The kidnappings and murders were so brazen as to be done within the town in broad daylight, which has a fully functional CID department. Once more, President Uhuru Kenyatta deployed detectives from the Serious Crimes Office (SCO) to handle the matter and since then, with the suspects on trial, we have not yet heard another case of murder or disappearances.
President Uhuru Kenyatta: Mnataka nifanye nini? He had to intervene personally on 2 cases related to deaths and/or Land which were originally mishandled by Thika CID
So when the Thika family got these threats, and knowing the ruthlessness of the individuals they were dealing with, they made a formal complaint to the Serious Crimes Office of the CID at CID HQs on Kiambu Road.
The SCO in turn invited the Cyber Crime Division who downloaded the data from the phone that received the threat and used it to track the source of the threatening messages. In turn, the CID summoned all the actors in the land saga and took statements from them. These included land brokers and known henchmen of the Kamotho family.
When everything was ready and the next steps of arrest and prosecution were imminent, the entire process came to a halt. No movement, no news! Who had the power to completely stall this entire criminal justice process?
Why should an application to ODPP to review the facts of a criminal prosecution cause an accused person(s) to be threatened with actual harm by their accusers in long running land feud?
ODPP: LESS THAN STELLAR PERFORMANCE AND DOUBLE STANDARDS
Only someone who believes that they control the prosecutorial process would be angry enough to threaten an accused person for “daring” to appeal to ODPP for a review of their case.
Secondly, the letter re-calling the investigation file would have had to be leaked from the office of Thika DCIO (who received the letter from ODPP) to the henchmen who later sent the threatening sms.
However, the most alarming thing is that ODPP, when faced with similar cases regarding ownership of land, applies separate and unequal standards.
The double standard is evident, in a case where 4 traders were charged over land that touched on former President Daniel Moi, DPP Keriako Tobiko sends his heavy hitters Dancun Ondimu and Patrick Gumo to withdraw the criminal case, to allow the High Court time to determine the ‘true ownership of the land in question’!
When Hon. Charity Ngilu and others, were hauled before the Chief Magistrate’s Court in Nairobi on criminal charges over the Karen Land saga, they were able to argue that there existed a simultaneous civil matter on the ownership of the Karen land at the High Court and that having 2 judicial processes running concurrently on the same matter would be prejudicial. Orders putting their prosecution ‘in abeyance’ were granted. ODPP, though entering appearance, did not oppose the said application and it therefore sailed through.
This is where the role of the ODPP and open favoritism or compromise appear.
The Thika family have on several occasions raised serious formal constitutional issues regarding how their opponents in a civil land ownership case at the High Court should be able to bring criminal prosecutions against them at the Chief Magistrates Court in Thika, when the matter at the High Court is still on-going.
In both the applications and even though ODPP was listed as a respondent and duly served, ODPP never once entered appearance.
The second mystery is that when the familys’ lawyer wrote to ODPP and later took a bold step of visiting ODPPs NSSF Building offices, they were informed that their prosecution file could not be found.
Yet from the court and police files there appear to be extensive correspondence from the ODPP.
Third and more confounding, when the letter for malicious prosecution and harassment by Thika DCIO started being followed up by the complaints department at ODPP, and an officer assigned to the investigation, they were suddenly uprooted from the case and now no longer respond to queries.
Questions arising:
- Who is powerful enough within ODPP to take this file and hide it, control and limit access to it?
- Who is powerful enough within ODPP to scare off the junior officers in the complaints department to cease making enquiries into an official matter?
- Who is powerful enough within ODPP to ensure that no assignment of officers is made to High court proceedings where ODPP has been formally served?
DIRECTORATE OF CRIMINAL INVESTIGATIONS:
DCI Ndegwa Muhoro received a copy of the letter alleging malicious prosecution by his officers in Thika in early 2016.
He invited the Thika family to his corner office, and summoned his then head of Land Fraud Unit – Victor Ndumba- to sit in on the discussion.
He listened quietly as the family poured out their frustrations and tribulations at the hands of the politically powerful Kamotho family, and the glaring irregularities within the CID investigation file that became the basis of the criminal prosecution facing this family.
DCI Ndegwa Muhoro ordered his then Head of Land fraud to re-open the entire investigation, re-look at the facts used to institute the criminal prosecution and revert to him within the shortest time possible.
The Head of Land Fraud (at the time) went through the motions of re-opening the investigation and assigning fresh officers to look at the facts. However, this was purely cosmetic because the investigation never left the confines of Mazingira House for an entire 6 months.
It took the re-shuffle of the entire Land Fraud Unit beginning with the senior officers and assignment of the case to new officers for the matter to gain new impetus.
Only recently have these new CID officers started to appreciate the rot within their department and how badly compromised their predecessors were to the extent of manufacturing or suppressing evidence, accepting openly false witness statements and colluding with Land officials in order to give undue advantage to powerful political forces.
We have often heard of junior officers who were so politically connected that they were the de jure leaders of their divisions or units within the Kenyan security forces. What should make Kenyans tremble with fear is when the chain-of-command within the forces meant to protect them, breaks down, orders are ignored.
Could this be the case in this scenario?
A former MP from Muran’ga County and astute Nairobi businessman, tells a story of how the Kamotho family sold him this disputed piece of land in Thika. Upon attempting to take possession of it he realized that he had been duped. He reported the matter to the same Land Fraud Unit of the CID at Mazingira House, on Kiambu road. He was given the run-around by the senior officer, on the basis that JJ Kamotho had been ailing for a long time.
Eventually, JJ Kamotho passed on in a South African Hospital and it appeared that the businessman had been duped of his money and the matter of his money had been overtaken by events.
THIKA CID ACT AS OFFICIAL ‘MUSCLE’
On several occasions over the last 5 years, JJ Kamotho has attempted to forcefully evict the occupiers of the land in Thika. On the three (3) such occasions he has hired goons and police officers from Thika CID to execute this. The picture above shows the demolition of houses on the land by the invading combined force.
It would be good to note that everytime the Thika family obtained a High Court order barring the Kamotho family and the Thika CID from interfering with the land, the invasion by hired thugs also miraculously stopped immediately.
We have seen for ourselves that Thika CID is obviously unable to solve real crimes, as evidenced by the intervention of H.E. Uhuru Kenyatta in the Hon. George Thuo and Kihiu Mwiri land deaths, but make themselves willing and available to concoct evidence for criminal prosecutions on behalf of one side of a land disagreement, whilst also acting as hired muscle for harassment and evictions.
Who then will save Kenyans by policing the police?
JJ KAMOTHO AND DAUGHTER: PRACTICED MACHINATIONS IN A ROTTEN SYSTEM
The Late Hon. John Joseph Kamotho was a truly detested figure in Kikuyuland. When Former President Moi executed his scorched earth policy on the entire Kikuyu Population by marginalizing, appropriating their property and finally outrightly killing them (as seen in the tribal clashes of 1992), JJ Kamotho, always devious and opportunistic saw an avenue to enrich himself at the expense of the entire Kikuyu community.
He invented himself into the chief KANU hawk and spokesman, a loud and abrasive character who would die for the then ruling party and its leader.
To many in Central Kenya, JJ Kamotho gleefully danced on the graves of his tribesmen and benefitted financially in the process.
It became apparent that he would never make it to parliament in the face of such anti-Moi sentiment in Central Province that President Moi had to carve out an entire constituency for him (Mathioya) from the larger Muranga. Even then, he was so hated that he lost the 1997 General election to little-known F Maina Njakwe.
It was probably his satirization by John ‘KJ’ Kiarie of the the Redykyulas trio that humanized him to a certain extent coupled with the humiliation at ‘Kisirani’ by Moi that won him a parliamentary term in the watershed 2002 elections.
What majority of Kenyans aren’t aware of was his insatiable lust for land and his brazen manner of acquiring it, by any means necessary.
At any one time, there are usually 2 or 3 land cases in Kenyan courts involving JJ Kamotho, the most recent high profile case being his annexation of land in Karura forest.
By 2012, it was apparent that JJ Kamotho was ailing and needed resources to cater for his medical bills. He also planned an attempt for the Senatorial seat of Muranga County. All these needed a lot of money.
It was starting to become obvious that even though he had spent the years of his prime in defense of the thankless KANU regime, JJ Kamotho was either sidelined or was too pre-occupied with his status to sit at the table, where other operatives were dining.
Therefore, in the twilight of his life, JJ Kamotho discovered that he hadn’t amassed sufficient wealth to continue enjoying the same status he was used to, he also had not set up any viable businesses (like other former KANU orphans) to leave for his children.
He therefore had no choice but to leave them a heritage of court cases and disenfranchisement of ordinary people.
His daughter MARYANNE NYOKABI KAMOTHO took to this inheritance like a duck takes to water.
Maryanne is a lawyer with the law firm Nyokabi Kamotho Advocates, based in Kitisuru. She doesn’t appear in court much and spends her time either chasing down the land cases her father bequeathed her or tenderpreneuring.
FILE TAMPERING: MARYANNE KAMOTHOS’ MODUS OPERANDI
Maryanne Nyokabi Kamotho adopted this method of staying in control of the entire situation. Using proceeds from the deposits paid to her from the two (2) fraudulent sales of the same land, she is able to influence senior officers to keep files away from public access.
THIKA LANDS OFFICE
The Thika Land Registrar keeps the file relating to this disputed piece of land in his drawer, where only he and his secretary have access to it.
Whenever anyone attempts to make enquiries into the file, his Secretary makes an urgent call to one of the Kamotho henchmen – who operates near the Land office, who in turn sprints to the registry to identify the enquirer and their motives.
A police officer who attempted to make such enquiries in the past was surprised to receive an ominous telephone call from a senior officer at the Land fraud unit, essentially warning him to keep off the matter.
In this way, any formal enquiry by the police or the Lands Department is managed. More importantly, when the land is sold to a third party, she is in control of the search process thereby ensuring that a ‘caution’ on the land is never filed.
HIGH COURT
The civil matter on the ownership of the Thika Land has been before the Environment and Land Division of the High Court for close to a decade. Soon after Maryanne Kamotho took over these cases, a trend began to appear where the court files were tampered with and needed constant reconstruction.
However, a more recent strategy has been to mis-file documents and applications intentionally. Whenever the trial judge opens the file, he sees only a jumble of documents without coherence and he is forced to take another mention date and order the file to be arranged in order.
Between 2015 and 2016, this intentional mis-filing of documents has occasioned the postponement of the civil matter on at least three (3) occasions.
CID LAND FRAUD UNIT
This is the investigative agency of last resort for many disenfranchised Kenyans who suffer at the hands of conniving land thieves and the famous land cartels.
The Kenyan taxpayer funds the specialist training of these officers in all processes relating to land acquisition and procurement of ownership documents.
In this case, it would appear that several alarming things happened.
- The investigation that culminated into the criminal prosecution of this complex land matter was intentionally given to an ordinary CID officer, one who hasn’t undergone any formal training on Land issues. The officer would ignore common-sense land details or take them at face value, thus obviously zealously interested in quickly obtaining a criminal conviction. To whose benefit? The citizens of the Republic of Kenya?
- It would seem that some former officers at LFU refused to press for the prosecution of the Kamotho duo over their roles in obtaining documents and money by false pretenses, from various individuals and entities.
Obviously, it can be surmised that some people within the department have been compromised and this is in-keeping with Kamotho philosophy.
OFFICE OF DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS
DPP Keriako Tobiko rode into office on a wave of goodwill and high hopes by Kenyans. His intellectual capacity was never in doubt since being handpicked by another legal genius (Amos Wako) for one of the top 5 legal firms, which stood him in good stead.
Why would he have created a system that can be misused by his juniors with the real catastrophic possibility of the conviction and imprisonment of innocent people?
The disappearance of the prosecution file for the criminal case against the Thika family from his NSSF offices, during a time when files no longer disappear(unbelievably) at Ardhi House and High Court, is something that should make Kenyans shudder with fear.
Where is this file and what exactly is inside it that someone is uncomfortable with having brought into the light?
JJ Kamotho and Maryanne Nyokabi Kamotho have walked too long in the shadows, playing an easily corruptible system for their benefit.
Why should innocents pay with their lives, livelihoods and property all because the old man (JJ Kamotho) lacked the fortitude to ‘jipanga’?
Where will the offices of the ODPP and DCI stand this time round?
Attached: Video from Paul Kobia telling President Uhuru Kenyatta of the danger posed by having the fake British accent St. Mary’s wanker Jomo Gecaga around him.