NAIROBI, Kenya, Feb 22 – A simmering row over the intersection of faith and politics has emerged within Jesus Compassion Ministry (JCM) after the head of its United States branch resigned in protest over the church’s decision to host President William Ruto during its anniversary celebrations.
Pastor Charles Wachira stepped down from his position shortly after the ministry’s Nairobi headquarters announced that the President had been invited to attend a special service marking the church’s third anniversary at its main sanctuary in Ruiru, Kiambu County.
The event, scheduled for Sunday, February 22, was billed as a milestone celebration for the fast-growing ministry.
However, Wachira said the invitation raised profound moral and leadership concerns at a time when sections of the public, particularly young Kenyans, have voiced anger over alleged excesses by state operatives and are calling for justice, accountability and institutional reform.
In a detailed statement announcing his resignation, the pastor said recent public engagements by the church leadership had deeply disturbed many believers, especially members of Generation Z who, he noted, are seeking moral clarity from religious institutions during what he described as a sensitive national moment.
He maintained that spiritual leadership must remain firmly grounded in truth, righteousness and the defense of innocent life, arguing that the church should not appear indifferent to the suffering or grievances of the wider population.
“When leadership actions create confusion, division or moral discomfort among believers, it becomes necessary to take a principled stand,” the statement read.
Wachira further referenced biblical teachings that caution against justifying wrongdoing and call on leaders to defend the oppressed, saying clergy have a responsibility to speak for those who cannot speak for themselves.
He emphasized that his decision to resign was guided by conviction rather than rebellion, adding that he would offer further clarification in due course.
JCM, led by Bishop Ben Kiengei, has grown rapidly in recent years and now operates dozens of branches locally and internationally, including in the United States, where Wachira had overseen its activities.
Kenya is in the grip of its worst number plate crisis in recent memory, with a staggering backlog of more than 70,000 unissued plates leaving thousands of vehicle owners, motorcycle riders, and tuk-tuk operators stranded — and some brazenly flouting the law by printing makeshift plates on plain paper.
The crisis, which has paralysed vehicle sales, blocked bank financing and choked the livelihoods of boda boda operators across the country, is being blamed squarely on the National Treasury’s chronic delays in releasing funds to the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA), leaving the state agency unable to pay its suppliers.
The scale of the breakdown is alarming. Motorcycle assemblers say the deficit in boda boda plates alone has ballooned to 51,000 units, while the Kenya Motor Industry Association (KMI) places the shortfall for new motor vehicles at 7,000. Tuk-tuk assemblers report a further 750 units outstanding. The cumulative crisis cuts across every segment of Kenya’s transport economy.
“Payment for number plates is through eCitizen, but the National Treasury then delays in funding NTSA which is late to pay suppliers,” one dealer, who asked not to be named. “We are the ones left holding the bill.”
NTSA, which has a long history of stonewalling the press on this issue, had not responded to queries as of press time. Industry insiders say sources within the authority have privately confirmed that the root cause is unpaid debts to suppliers — a damning indictment of government fiscal management.
The situation has become so desperate that some motorcycle riders have taken to writing their registration details on paper and displaying them where the official plate should be affixed. The practice is not only alarming but illegal, and it exposes those riders to serious criminal sanction.
Under the Traffic Act, any person who fails to properly affix a government-issued number plate commits an offence punishable by a fine of up to Sh300,000, imprisonment of up to 12 months, or both. Yet with no plates to collect, desperate riders say they have no choice.
Dealers have meanwhile been forced to lean heavily on Kenya Dealers (KD) number plates as a stopgap. These temporary plates — meant only for vehicles being ferried from the port of Mombasa or offered for test drives — are valid solely between 6am and 6pm, creating a logistical nightmare for businesses that operate around the clock.
A Recurring Scandal That Will Not Go Away
What makes the current crisis especially damaging is that it is not new. Kenya has now suffered number plate shortages in August 2024, April 2025, November 2025, and again now in February 2026 — a pattern that points not to isolated supply hiccups but to a structural failure at the heart of government procurement.
In May 2025, NTSA Board Chairperson Khatib Mwashetani held a press briefing to declare the problem resolved, with Director General George Njao pledging the authority was “back on track.” By November 2025, the shortage had returned, with dealers reporting that plates for the KDV-W, X, Y and Z series had simply stopped coming. The assurances rang hollow.
“There is an industry outcry and it is a big one,” Charles Munyori, Secretary-General of the Kenya Auto Bazaar Association (KABA), said during the November flare-up. “You cannot do bank transfers for the cars without a number plate. These delays hit us hard, especially when buyers have already paid.”
The production of Kenya’s number plates is carried out at Kamiti Maximum Security Prison, a facility that reportedly has the capacity to produce only around 1,000 plates per day. That modest output, already strained by Kenya’s surging vehicle registrations — which jumped 25 percent to 75,059 in the first eight months of 2025 alone — has been repeatedly derailed by what insiders describe as the government’s failure to pay the prison’s commercial department on time.
The consequences extend far beyond simple inconvenience. Kenya’s banking sector, which finances the majority of vehicle purchases in a market where high-value transactions rarely go through in cash, insists on fully registered vehicles before advancing loans. With plates stuck in bureaucratic limbo, buyers who have already committed funds find themselves in financial suspension, unable to take delivery of their purchases.
For boda boda riders, the impact is even more visceral. Motorcycles are the economic lifeline of millions of Kenyans, ferrying workers, delivering goods and connecting communities across the country. The plate backlog — now frozen at the KMGV/C production series — has left thousands of newly assembled bikes sitting idle, unable to legally hit the road, stripping riders of their only source of income.
The irony is not lost on industry observers. Kenya spent years rolling out its new generation of digital number plates, complete with QR codes, holograms, unique front-and-back NTSA serial numbers and an embossed Kenyan flag. The plates were celebrated as a security upgrade that would curb plate cloning and integrate with revenue collection systems.
Yet the very agency tasked with delivering this innovation cannot maintain a consistent supply. A digital plate for a motor vehicle costs Sh3,050, while motorcycle plates go for Sh1,550 — fees that Kenyans have been paying faithfully through the eCitizen portal, only to find themselves waiting indefinitely.
Critics argue that the government is, in effect, collecting revenue from citizens for a service it is refusing to render — a situation they describe as tantamount to a breach of public trust.
Vehicle dealers, motorcycle assemblers and transport operators are now calling on the National Treasury and the Ministry of Transport to treat the crisis as a national emergency, ringfence dedicated funding for number plate production, and hold NTSA publicly accountable for the recurring breakdown.
“This is not a new problem. It is the same problem, over and over again,” one industry veteran said. “And every time it happens, NTSA goes silent, makes promises it cannot keep, and leaves Kenyans to suffer the consequences.”
With tens of thousands of unregistered vehicles on the roads, a paralysed second-hand car market and boda boda riders risking arrest to put food on their tables, Kenya’s number plate crisis has moved well beyond a supply chain inconvenience. It is, at its core, a governance failure — one that ordinary Kenyans are paying for, literally and figuratively.
The man at the helm of Kenya’s basic education bureaucracy is in the eye of a storm, and this time, the thunder is coming from both sides of the aisle.
Basic Education Principal Secretary Prof Julius Bitok is facing the most withering assault of his tenure, with Members of Parliament from across the political divide painting a portrait of a senior government official who is absent, unresponsive, and — in the most damning indictment yet — clueless about the state of the very sector he is paid to run.
The fury boiled over publicly at the recent National Assembly retreat in Naivasha, where Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba found himself standing alone before a hostile chamber, fielding question after question on issues that lawmakers said squarely belonged to his PS. Bitok was nowhere to be found.
National Assembly Majority Leader Kimani Ichung’wah did not bother with diplomatic niceties. He went straight for the jugular.
“You have the most clueless PS in the Ministry of Education. He only sits in Nairobi and has no idea what is happening on the ground,” Ichung’wah declared to thunderous applause from fellow lawmakers at the retreat, adding that it was MPs, not ministry officials, who had been reduced to acting as de facto school inspectors across the country.
Ichung’wah challenged Bitok to leave his Nairobi office and go to the ground, warning that only then could the ministry make a credible case before the House for the billions it requires to fix the education sector.
The issues raised were not trivial. MPs confronted CS Ogamba over the chaotic transition to Grade 10 under the Competency-Based Curriculum, the wildly unequal distribution of teachers across schools, chronic underfunding, understaffing, and the brazen exploitation of parents by school principals who impose arbitrary charges. Ichung’wah pointed to the glaring absurdity of a school with 100 students having 28 teachers while a neighbouring school of 600 pupils had none, and asked who exactly was minding the store at the ministry.
What made the situation even more combustible was that Bitok, rather than appearing before the aggrieved lawmakers, responded on social media. He posted a photograph of himself inspecting schools in Kikuyu constituency — the very constituency represented by Ichung’wah himself — with the caption: “On the ground! On call! On duty!” The move was seen by MPs as a brazen provocation.
The Naivasha spectacle was, however, merely the opening act.
On Thursday, the Education Committee of the National Assembly convened to deliberate on the Budget Policy Statement for the Basic Education Department — a critical exercise in which the ministry is expected to defend its proposed expenditure before Parliament. Bitok again failed to show up.
The committee took fierce issue with Bitok’s absence, with MPs calling for sanctions and accountability over what they termed a pattern of contempt for the legislature.
Committee chairman Julius Melly did not mince words. “It is not the first time that he has failed to appear in this very important session. We are really saddened and our timelines are now over. We condemn the behaviour of the PS and more importantly, the casual manner in which he is carrying out his work,” he said, warning that the committee would explore the harshest punitive measures available under parliamentary standing orders.
Mandera South MP Abdul Haro went further, calling for Bitok to be made an example to every other PS in government who might be tempted to treat Parliament with similar disdain. Luanda MP Dick Maungu said the pattern of behaviour had been consistent since Bitok was transferred from the Immigration department to Jogoo House.
Maungu said Bitok had consistently failed to attend committee meetings since his arrival at the Education ministry, including in the previous year when a similar summons was issued and equally ignored.
Igembe North MP Julius Taitumu said the House was done talking. “We don’t need to belabour this. We are in concurrence that this is not expected behaviour from the leadership of this country,” he said, as the committee resolved to schedule an emergency session with the PS for the following Tuesday.
The pressure on Bitok is not confined to the National Assembly chambers. Out in the constituencies, the verdict is just as damning.
Bumula MP Jack Wamboka has called on President William Ruto to remove Bitok from office entirely, accusing him of presiding over systemic failures that have crippled the education sector and frustrated key government reforms. Wamboka described Bitok as “a politician” who does not belong in a technical reform role, suggesting he be released to contest for elective office in Uasin Gishu instead.
Wamboka also disclosed that schools had received only Sh7,000 per learner out of an expected annual capitation of Sh22,000, blaming what he called poor planning by the PS for a funding shortfall that has left school heads unable to meet basic operational costs.
Even the praise directed at CS Ogamba has been weaponised against his PS. Several MPs have distinguished sharply between the two men, saying the Cabinet Secretary is being actively undermined by a PS who provides neither technical support nor institutional competence. Wamboka praised Ogamba as doing his best while being dragged behind by Bitok.
For his part, Bitok has attempted to fight back. Hours after the Naivasha retreat, he unveiled an online portal for reporting corruption or malpractice in the placement of Grade 10 learners into senior secondary schools, framing it as a personal commitment to integrity and accountability in basic education. The gesture was met with scepticism by lawmakers who said it was too little, too late, and no substitute for physical presence and institutional accountability.
The accumulation of crises facing the education sector — teacher rationalisation failures, capitation shortfalls, uniform cartels, the messy CBC transition, withheld student certificates, and now a PS who will not appear before Parliament — has created a political firestorm that shows no signs of cooling.
With the Budget Policy Statement process already delayed, the National Assembly Education Committee facing its own credibility test over its ability to hold the executive to account, and an electorate increasingly restless over the state of public schools, Bitok’s position has never looked more precarious.
The committee has scheduled another sitting with the PS for Tuesday. Whether he shows up will tell the country everything it needs to know about where this standoff is headed.
NAIROBI, Kenya Feb 22 – Former President Uhuru Kenyatta on Sunday issued a clarification after reports that a group of young people planned to visit his Ichaweri home.
In a statement released by his office and signed by Communication Secretary Kanze Dena Mararo, Uhuru confirmed that there were reports of an intended youth visit to his private residence in Ichaweri, Gatundu.
However, the former president said he is currently not in a position to host the group.
“We encourage organizers of such initiatives to formally communicate with the Office in advance so that arrangements can be made for structured, peaceful, and meaningful dialogue,” Dena said.
The Office of the former president did not name the group and no formal request had been submitted to Uhuru Kenyatta’s office at the time.
“Former President Kenyatta remains open to meeting and exchanging views in a dignified manner that fosters unity and mutual respect,” Dena said.
The statement praised Kenyan youth for their energy, ideas, and patriotism, saying Uhuru strongly believes young people must be part of national conversations.
His office stressed that while he values dialogue, any engagement must be properly organised, peaceful, and formally communicated in advance.
“Kenya belongs to all of us. Let us always choose dialogue over disruption and engagement over division,” the statement said.
NAIROBI — Seven years after the savage killing of a 26-year-old pregnant university student sent shockwaves across Kenya, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions has delivered what it calls an iron-clad case against former Migori Governor Zacharia Okoth Obado, painting him not merely as a man with motive, but as the architect of one of the country’s most chilling political murders.
In final submissions filed before the Milimani High Court on Friday, the prosecution placed Obado squarely at the centre of the September 2018 killing of Sharon Otieno, a former Rongo University student who was abducted, sexually assaulted, stabbed eight times, strangled and dumped in a thicket in Oyugis, Homa Bay County. She was 28 weeks pregnant at the time of her death, carrying Obado’s child.
The prosecution’s case, led by Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions Gikui Gichuhi, rested on a simple but devastating proposition: that Sharon Otieno had become a political liability that Obado could not afford, and that he used the machinery around him to eliminate her.
“The evidence paints a coherent picture of the accused acting in concert, with a shared intention to eliminate Sharon Otieno and silence a key witness to avoid political fallout, reputational harm and embarrassment,” Gichuhi submitted before presiding judge Cecilia Githua.
A Web of Trusted Insiders
What makes the prosecution’s narrative particularly damning is the structure it attributes to the alleged murder plot. Obado did not act alone, the State argues. He allegedly deployed his most trusted operatives: personal assistant Michael Juma Oyamo and close associate Caspal Obiero. These were not strangers hired off the street. These were men embedded in Obado’s inner circle, men who knew his secrets and, prosecutors allege, were willing to act on his behalf.
Both Oyamo and Obiero were allegedly present at Graca Hotel in Rongo town on the evening of September 3, 2018, the night Sharon and a protected witness identified only as XYZ were lured into a waiting vehicle and abducted. The vehicle used in the abduction, registration number KCL 418K, was linked to Obiero’s household and driven by a close associate of the accused persons.
“They were not casual employees; they were trusted insiders,” the prosecution stated, underlining what it described as the hallmark of a joint criminal enterprise. “The actions of the three accused persons were complementary and directed toward silencing the deceased and neutralising XYZ.”
The Motive: Pregnancy, Media, and Political Survival
The prosecution’s theory of motive is as straightforward as it is devastating. Sharon, according to the State, had threatened to go public with her relationship with the then-sitting governor. She had already made contact with the media, and XYZ, a journalist, was actively pursuing the story. For a governor with political ambitions and a public image to protect, the exposure of an extramarital affair and an out-of-wedlock pregnancy was, prosecutors argue, an existential threat.
“The evidence shows that Sharon Otieno’s pregnancy and engagement with XYZ posed a real and imminent threat to the first accused’s public standing,” the prosecution submitted. “He was the ultimate beneficiary of the offence.”
The prosecution brought before the court 42 witnesses and 81 exhibits, including forensic reports, phone data analysis, cybercrime investigations and eyewitness accounts to build what it described as a complete, interlocking picture of premeditated murder. Two used condoms were among items recovered from the scene where Sharon’s mutilated body was found.
Gichuhi told the court the killing was not a spontaneous act of passion but a calculated operation, planned, facilitated, executed and subsequently concealed by all three accused persons acting together.
Obado Fires Back: “Not A Shred of Direct Evidence”
Obado, never one to shrink from confrontation, came before the court with submissions that were as forceful as they were emotional. Represented by Senior Counsel Kioko Kilukumi, the former governor denied any involvement in Sharon’s killing, insisting that being her lover and the father of her unborn child was the only basis upon which he had been dragged into the dock.
“I did not kill Sharon Otieno. I did not conspire with my two co-defendants or anyone to kill the late Sharon Otieno. I did not procure anybody to kill the late Sharon Otieno,” Obado told the court in his own voice, a rare moment of raw denial in a trial that has wound through years of legal argument.
Through his legal team, Obado maintained that the prosecution had built its case on speculation, suspicion and arm-chair theories that fell far short of the standard of proof beyond reasonable doubt. He argued that his call data records confirmed he was in Nairobi on the night in question, preparing for an official trip to Rwanda, and that no direct evidence had ever been placed before the court linking him to the planning, procurement or execution of the killing.
“No evidence was ever adduced to demonstrate that the first accused knew of a meeting at Graca Hotel, Rongo, at the material time,” his submissions read. “No evidence was adduced that the accused hired, procured or otherwise contracted the killers directly or indirectly.”
Kilukumi went further, alleging that the vehicle presented by the prosecution as the abduction vehicle had been planted by police, and that investigators had deliberately destroyed or avoided obtaining independent evidence that would have verified or challenged their own theory. The defence also alleged that the driver’s mobile phone had been falsely reported as switched off to prevent call data from revealing his actual location.
“Regrettably, instead of pursuing objective, independent, scientific and professional criminal investigations, the investigators were consumed by suspicions and devoted their efforts to proving those suspicions correct,” Obado submitted.
The Weight of Seven Years
The Sharon Otieno case has cast a long shadow over Kenyan public life since that September night in 2018. It surfaced during a period of heightened scrutiny of political impunity, prompted national debate about the safety of women who dare to challenge powerful men, and has remained a touchstone for accountability advocates ever since.
Obado, who served as Migori Governor from 2013 to 2022, acknowledged that he had a romantic relationship with Sharon and that he had financially supported her, sending her Sh100,000 as recently as August 17, 2018, just 16 days before her death. He also acknowledged an agreement to purchase her land in Homa Bay and build her a three-bedroom house. He maintained, however, that these gestures reflected his commitment to her welfare, not guilt over her killing.
The court had previously ruled that all three accused persons, Obado, Oyamo and Obiero, had a case to answer after the prosecution closed its evidence. That ruling was itself significant, signalling that the evidence presented had met the threshold required to demand an explanation from the accused.
With both the prosecution and defence having closed their cases and filed final submissions, the matter now rests entirely in the hands of Justice Cecilia Githua. The court is set to reconvene on March 18, 2026, when procedural matters will be finalised and a formal date set for delivery of the judgment.
For Sharon Otieno’s family, for accountability watchers, and for a Kenyan public that has followed this case through years of hearings, adjournments and revelations, that date cannot come soon enough. The question of whether Obado, once one of the country’s most powerful county bosses, will be held criminally responsible for the death of a young woman carrying his child is one that will define, for many, whether Kenya’s justice system can reach even the most politically connected.
The prosecution’s closing message to the court was unambiguous: “There is no reasonable doubt.”
Obado’s answer was equally unequivocal: “The prosecution has miserably failed.”
Between those two positions, Justice Githua must now decide.
This story was compiled from court submissions and proceedings at the Milimani High Court, Nairobi.
A 33-year-old woman who had been arrested by police over claims linked to a social media post has finally been released following an ordeal that also saw her mother allegedly harassed and briefly detained by officers in Nakuru.
May Jerono took to her social media in the wee hours of Sunday and confirmed that she was safe after she was arrested on Saturday.
“Thank you, I am safe. Shout out to all my Facebook friends, nawashukuru sana. To my enemies, I’m loved bana si mliona chesaa. I’m so overwhelmed, I just wanted to say thank you. I’m at home, I’m safe. I just want to rest, then tomorrow I will tell you all what really happened. Everything that you need to know,” she said.
She added that authorities had confiscated her phone, which delayed updates about her whereabouts.
“They took my phone, which is why I was unable to update anything from yesterday. But I was released very early, around 10:00 am, but they had some other things they were dealing with, so I had to wait. The rest I had to travel from Kitale to Nakuru its five hours. That is why I took long,” she said.
Jerono also assured the public that she would provide a full account of the events once she rested.
“Tomorrow I’ll tell you everything that you need to know. I’ll also be getting another phone tomorrow, so even if they return the other one, I won’t use it,” she added.
Her assurance comes amid public attention over her arrest, with calls for investigations into the conduct of officers involved and the alleged harassment of her mother.
The arrest sparked condemnation from political leaders, including People’s Liberation Party leader Martha Karua, who criticised the police for allegedly targeting Jerono’s mother to pressure her daughter.
“The arrest of a mother to coerce her daughter to show up at the police station is totally unacceptable and criminal,” Karua said.
Police in Nakuru came under scrutiny over their handling of the incident. Jerono’s mother, Census Ruto, a primary school teacher, recounted being humiliated at Athinai Primary School when officers allegedly stormed her classroom, forcing her to sit on the floor in front of students and colleagues.
“Walikuja ndani ya shule na kuni harass vibaya mbele ya wanafunzi wangu na walimu… walininyanganya ata simu nilikuwa nayo kwa nguvu… I was just shocked and asked why all these wanasema nitajulia mbele,” Ms Ruto said.
The ordeal extended beyond the school, with Ruto alleging that officers took her to Kaptembwo Police Station for charges she did not understand.
“Kufika police station, kidogo msichana wangu akaingia, wakaanza kukataa ata tusiongee na msichana… ata kwa nyumba yake waliransack kila mahali,” she said.
Speaking through her lawyer, Jerono explained that plain-clothed officers had picked her up without a clear reason and later went to her family home, where her mother was allegedly harassed. Her lawyer described the arrest as unprocedural and intended to intimidate Jerono over her freedom of expression, emphasising that the social media post in question did not constitute a criminal offence.
The Kenyan government has demanded the repatriation of its citizens killed or captured while reportedly fighting for Russia in the war in Ukraine, following new intelligence disclosures that more than 1,000 Kenyans are currently involved in the conflict.
Kenya’s principal intelligence agency told parliament this week that over 1,000 nationals are fighting for Russia, an increase from the roughly 200 cited by Foreign Affairs Minister Musalia Mudavadi in November.
The updated figures have heightened concerns over foreign recruitment and national security.
In response, Principal Secretary for Foreign Affairs Korir Sing’Oei met Russian Ambassador Vsevolod Tkachenko in Nairobi on Friday.
“During our talks, I conveyed the Government’s grave concern regarding Kenyan nationals currently caught up in the Russia-Ukraine conflict,” Sing’Oei said in a statement after the meeting on Friday.
Sing’Oei said Kenya had requested unimpeded consular access to its citizens and clear protocols for the repatriation of prisoners of war and the remains of those killed.
“I called for unimpeded consular access to our citizens and sought clear, transparent protocols regarding the repatriation of both prisoners of war and the remains of the deceased,” he added.
“Our priority remains the safety and dignity of every Kenyan abroad. I welcomed the cooperation of the embassy in staving off any illegal recruitment of Kenyans.”
Kenya’s Principal Secretary Korir Sing’Oei met with Russian Ambassador Tkachenko, in Nairobi, urging return of Kenyans fighting for Russia in Ukraine.
Mudavadi is expected to visit Moscow in March as part of diplomatic efforts to address the issue of Kenyan nationals involved in the war.
Moscow has denied recruiting Kenyans to fight in Ukraine. The Russian Embassy in Nairobi said on Thursday it had noted “a dangerous and misleading propaganda campaign” in the media regarding Kenyans’ participation in the conflict.
Kenyan security officials have attributed much of the recruitment to unlicensed agencies operating in the country. Authorities say some agencies allegedly lure job seekers with promises of security or construction work abroad, only for recruits to end up in combat zones.
Officials added that many recruits travel through other African countries before reaching Russia, complicating monitoring and enforcement efforts.
Governments across Africa and Asia have previously warned citizens against joining the conflict, due to legal and security risks.
Other African nations, including Nigeria and South Africa, have also raised concerns about their nationals recruited by Moscow.
In November, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andriy Sybigasaid at least 1,436 citizens from 36 African countries had been identified among Russian ranks.
A Nairobi man has made explosive allegations of child trafficking against Dr Ben Chumo, the former managing director of Kenya Power and Lighting Company (KPLC), accusing the one-time utility boss of orchestrating the abduction and illegal removal of his two minor sons from Kenya and flying them out to Australia without his knowledge or legal authorisation.
Kevin Oduor, who describes himself as the primary caregiver of six-year-old Kwame Jamari Oduor and five-year-old Tafari Zane Oduor for over four years, says the children were taken from the country on the night of December 12, 2025, aboard an Emirates Airline flight departing at 10pm, allegedly by Dr Chumo and his son Victor Chumo. The boys have not been returned. Their father says he has neither seen nor spoken to them in 67 days.
“My two minor sons were unlawfully removed from Kenya last night without my consent. I am their father and primary caregiver. This is child trafficking,” Oduor wrote in a social media post on December 13, 2025, a day after the alleged removal.
The children’s mother, who is reported to be Dr Chumo’s daughter, separated from Oduor and has since been residing in Australia. Sources close to the matter indicate the marriage broke down approximately four years ago, around the same time Oduor says he assumed sole care of the two boys. A custody dispute was reportedly filed in a Kenyan court but was never concluded.
Oduor alleges that the operation was carried out under false pretences. He says the children were told they were going to visit their grandfather, only for Dr Chumo to switch off his phone immediately afterwards and move the boys beyond reach. He further claims that Australian visas were issued to the minors without his consent as the father, a matter he says raises grave questions about due process and child protection failures within Kenya’s immigration system and the relevant foreign high commission.
“There is a custody matter that was in court but never concluded,” Oduor said. “Dr Chumo claims to have a court order, yet I have never been served with any order allowing travel. How they acquired visas without my consent, the high commission has to tell me.”
In a chilling follow-up post published this week, Oduor issued a direct public challenge to the 65-year-old former parastatal boss, demanding the production of any purported court order and questioning why, if such an order existed, it was never formally served upon him.
“If you had a lawful court order, why was it not formally served upon me? Why was deception used instead of due process? Why has this alleged court order never been produced for verification?” Oduor demanded, addressing Chumo by name.
The post has since gone viral across Kenyan social media platforms, reigniting public interest in the powerful former technocrat who spent over three decades at Kenya Power, including four years at its helm between 2013 and 2017.
Oduor also disclosed a deeply alarming encounter on the evening of Friday, February 19, 2026, when five officers from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI), drawn from Gigiri Police Station and arriving in a Subaru Outback registration KCP 763N, appeared at his residence after 5pm. He says the officers, four male and one female, declined to properly identify themselves and sought to arrest him over what appear to be defamation allegations, reportedly connected to his public campaign to locate his children.
“Since when does defamation justify five DCI officers and a late-evening home visit? Why was I not formally summoned during official working hours? Why the refusal to identify yourselves?” Oduor wrote, laying the responsibility for any harm to his person squarely at Chumo’s door.
He ended his post with a stark declaration: “Dr Ben Chumo, produce my children, whether dead or alive. I will not be intimidated.”
Kenya Insights could not immediately reach Dr Ben Chumo, Victor Chumo or the children’s mother for comment. The DCI did not respond to queries by the time of going to press.
If the allegations are proven, the case would constitute a serious violation of Kenyan law. Under the Children Act 2022, the removal of a child from Kenya without the consent of all persons with parental responsibility, or without a court order, is a criminal offence. The Counter-Trafficking in Persons Act similarly criminalises the recruitment, transportation or transfer of a child across borders, regardless of whether the perpetrator claims parental or family ties.
Legal experts contacted by Kenya Insights warned that the case raises disturbing questions about how the children secured travel documents. Under Kenyan regulations, minors require the consent of both parents for passport issuance and international travel, unless a court order specifying otherwise has been obtained and verified. The alleged issuance of Australian visas without the knowledge of one parent, if confirmed, would compound the severity of the breach.
Dr Chumo is no stranger to controversy. The veteran energy sector technocrat spent 32 years at Kenya Power before retiring as Managing Director in January 2017 upon attaining the mandatory retirement age of 60.
His tenure was later overshadowed by a high-profile graft prosecution in which he and 14 others faced charges of conspiring to fraudulently acquire public property and abuse of office, relating to the procurement of substandard transformers worth Sh408 million from a company called Muwa Trading Company.
The case, which has dragged on for years, saw crucial documents go missing at one point, with Chumo summoned by the DCI for questioning over the disappearance.
Despite the pending charges, President Uhuru Kenyatta in June 2018 nominated Chumo as Chairman of the Salaries and Remuneration Commission, a nomination that triggered fierce opposition from lawmakers and was eventually set aside.
More recently, a consultancy firm he co-founded, Eagle HR Consultants Limited, was awarded a Sh20 million Kenya Power contract in 2024, raising fresh eyebrows over his enduring influence in state circles.
It is this institutional clout that Oduor appears to be drawing attention to, suggesting that powerful connections may be shielding those responsible for the removal of his children from accountability.
Child rights organisations have begun taking note. The matter touches on gaps that advocates say have long existed in Kenya’s enforcement of international family law, including the country’s obligations under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, which Kenya ratified. Australia is also a signatory to the convention, which in principle requires the prompt return of children who have been wrongfully removed from their country of habitual residence.
For now, Oduor says he is documenting every development, has engaged legal counsel and is alerting relevant authorities. He has appealed to the DCI, the Children’s Department and the public to assist in securing the return of Kwame and Tafari.
“Silencing a father who is demanding answers does not resolve the underlying issue. It only deepens it,” he wrote.
The Star will continue to follow developments in this case.
The Kenya Meteorological Department has issued a heavy rainfall alert covering large parts of the country, warning residents to brace for potential floods from Saturday, February 21, to Wednesday, February 25, 2026.
The advisory affects counties across the Lake Victoria Basin, the Rift Valley, the Highlands east and west of the Rift Valley, including Nairobi, and is expected to spread to the South-eastern Lowlands and Coastal region, particularly the South Coast.
According to Met, rainfall in the affected areas is likely to exceed 20mm within 24 hours on Saturday and may intensify to more than 30mm daily from Sunday to Tuesday (February 22-24).
The intensity of the rainfall is expected to reduce on February 25.
Counties listed as high risk include Migori, Nyamira, Bungoma, Kakamega, Embu, Murang’a, Nyeri, Tharaka-Nithi, Kisii, Narok, Kajiado, Makueni, Machakos, Nairobi, Kericho, Bomet, Taita-Taveta, Kitui, Kwale, Mombasa, southern Tana River, and parts of Kilifi.
“We urge residents to take precautionary measures and monitor official updates closely. Heavy rainfall can cause sudden flooding even in areas that might not have experienced significant rain, so preparedness is critical,” Kenya Met Acting Managing Director Edward Muriuki said in a statement.
The department has advised residents to avoid driving or walking through moving water, to be cautious in open fields, and to watch out for flash floods in low-lying areas and riverine regions.
“Flood waters can move fast and may appear downstream from areas that are currently dry. People must exercise extreme caution,” the Muriuki added.
This advisory comes after weeks of sporadic rainfall across the country, with some regions already reporting waterlogging and minor flooding.
Meteorologists warn that the upcoming rains are part of the seasonal weather patterns but may intensify due to changing climatic conditions.
Local authorities in high-risk areas have been urged to ensure drainage systems are cleared, schools and public facilities prepare for potential disruptions, and emergency services remain on standby.
Residents in Nairobi and surrounding counties are reminded to monitor updates from KMD through its website, WhatsApp channel, and FASTA-Ken platform.
The Department has also encouraged the public to follow county-specific forecasts to better understand local risks.
It emphasised that although the probability of heavy rainfall is moderate (33%–66% chance), the impact could be significant in flood-prone regions.
“Even a moderate probability should not be taken lightly. Early action saves lives and reduces property damage,” Muriuki said.
Kenya has in the past experienced severe flooding following heavy rainfall, causing loss of life, property destruction, and disruption of transport networks.
With this alert, authorities are urging residents to plan ahead, move valuables to safer areas, and avoid walking or driving through floodwaters under any circumstances.
The advisory remains valid from February 21, at 3pm until February 25, 6pm with updates to be issued as conditions evolve.
The Russian embassy in Kenya on Friday denied that embassy officials were behind networks recruiting soldiers from Africa to fight in Ukraine, calling the accusations “a dangerous and misleading propaganda campaign”.
“We deny in the strongest possible terms the involvement of the embassy and its staff in rogue recruitment schemes,” said a spokesperson for the embassy in Nairobi. “We refute any collusion with entities or individuals who would force or entrap Kenyans under false pretences.”
According to a report compiled by Kenyan intelligence officers and presented to the country’s MPs, more than 1,000 Kenyans have travelled to Russia and ended up on the battlefield in the country’s war against Ukraine.
This figure is far higher than the 200 Kenyans cited by the authorities
Russia says it is aware that foreigners are fighting in its ranks, but has always presented them as volunteers.
“We denounce a dangerous and misleading propaganda campaign,” the embassy spokespeson added.
‘Vast recruitment pool’
The South African government said in November 2025 it had received “distress calls” from 17 men trapped in heavy fighting in Ukraine’s Donbas region, after being tricked into joining mercenary forces.
The group All Eyes on Wagner, an investigative organisation that tracks mercenary activity, published a report this month listing 1,417 fighters from 35 African countries who joined the Russian army between 2023 and mid-2025. It said 316 had died.
It follows a Ukrainian intelligence reportpublished in 2024. The survey said Moscow had recruited foreign nationals from Somalia, Rwanda, Burundi, Congo and Uganda as well as Nepal, India and Cuba, while nationals of several more countries have spoken to the media about their ordeal.
According to the French Institute of International Relations, African countries are fertile ground for Russian recruiters.
Sub-Saharan Africa in particular represents “a vast and easily accessible recruitment pool due to high poverty rates in most countries in the region, combined with a strong desire to emigrate”, the think tank said in a report released in December 2025.
The report said Russia’s recruitment campaigns target “poor urban youth” seeking a better life, and that many realise “that Europe is an increasingly inaccessible destination”.
‘Vast recruitment pool’
The South African government said in November 2025 it had received “distress calls” from 17 men trapped in heavy fighting in Ukraine’s Donbas region, after being tricked into joining mercenary forces.
The group All Eyes on Wagner, an investigative organisation that tracks mercenary activity, published a report this month listing 1,417 fighters from 35 African countries who joined the Russian army between 2023 and mid-2025. It said 316 had died.
It follows a Ukrainian intelligence reportpublished in 2024. The survey said Moscow had recruited foreign nationals from Somalia, Rwanda, Burundi, Congo and Uganda as well as Nepal, India and Cuba, while nationals of several more countries have spoken to the media about their ordeal.
According to the French Institute of International Relations, African countries are fertile ground for Russian recruiters.
Sub-Saharan Africa in particular represents “a vast and easily accessible recruitment pool due to high poverty rates in most countries in the region, combined with a strong desire to emigrate”, the think tank said in a report released in December 2025.
The report said Russia’s recruitment campaigns target “poor urban youth” seeking a better life, and that many realise “that Europe is an increasingly inaccessible destination”.
When the ballots were counted and the figures flashed across screens, the verdict from the bar was emphatic. Senior Counsel Charles Kanjama had not merely edged past his rivals. He had carved out a decisive mandate to become the 52nd president of the Law Society of Kenya.
With 3,728 votes against Peter Wanyama’s 2,616 and Mwaura Kabata’s 2,086, Kanjama’s victory was as much about arithmetic as it was about psychology.
He read the mood of the profession with forensic precision and built a coalition that cut across generations at a time when the society appeared poised for an internal culture war.
The 2026 race was framed as a battle for the soul of the bar. The Young Bar, restless and numerically significant, had become the focus of aggressive courtship. Both Wanyama and Kabata directed considerable political capital toward younger advocates, promising welfare reforms and relief from the weight of Continuous Professional Development requirements.
Kanjama did not ignore them. He simply refused to reduce his campaign to them.
Instead, he executed a quieter, more calibrated strategy. While his opponents competed for dominance within the youth vote, he consolidated the Middle and Senior Bar, constituencies often underestimated in raw mobilisation calculus. As a Senior Counsel admitted to the bar in 2003, he spoke their language of institutional memory, professional discipline and constitutional guardianship. He framed the election not as a generational rebellion but as a moment demanding sobriety.
That message resonated.
At campaign forums and office visits, Kanjama projected steadiness in contrast to the sharper rhetoric that defined parts of the contest. His RIPE agenda, shorthand for Rule of Law, Integrity and Independence, Practice and Engagement, was marketed less as a slogan and more as a governance blueprint. For many seasoned practitioners anxious about the society’s posture ahead of the 2027 General Election cycle, the promise of structured leadership carried weight.
The symbolism mattered. Outgoing president Faith Odhiambo had cultivated an image of a bar willing to confront executive overreach. Senior figures, including former LSK president Okongo Omogeni and political heavyweight Kalonzo Musyoka, openly underscored the need for independence and constitutional vigilance. Kanjama aligned himself squarely within that tradition, positioning continuity of institutional courage as a central plank of his candidacy.
Yet the election was not merely about high constitutional theory. Welfare politics ran through the campaign like a live wire. Kanjama promised to professionalise mentorship, expand partnerships with the LSK Sacco and the Advocates Benevolent Association, and complete the long delayed Wakili Towers project under transparent procurement discipline. He pledged to establish a training institute to systematise Continuing Professional Development. These were not abstract ideals. They addressed bread and butter anxieties in a profession grappling with uneven earnings and mounting regulatory demands.
Crucially, his final campaign meeting reportedly drew about 850 lawyers across the generational spectrum. In a contest where only about 8,600 advocates voted out of more than 26,000 registered members, turnout mechanics were decisive. While critics lamented voter apathy, Kanjama’s camp ensured that its supporters converted enthusiasm into ballots.
His acceptance speech was calibrated to reinforce legitimacy. He invoked the sanctity of the members’ will and rejected the notion that internal politics could bend it. The subtext was clear. In a society often entangled in national political crosscurrents, the bar had chosen leadership it believed could not be easily intimidated.
For Wanyama and Kabata, the postmortem will likely centre on vote fragmentation within the Young Bar. By splitting a constituency both had aggressively targeted, they inadvertently opened space for a candidate who had already banked the confidence of more established practitioners and still managed to siphon a slice of the youth vote.
Kanjama’s challenge now shifts from campaign choreography to institutional delivery. The presidency of the Law Society is less a ceremonial honour and more a constitutional office in waiting. As the country inches toward another charged electoral season, the bar’s independence will again be tested in courtrooms and public squares.
In clinching the presidency, Charles Kanjama persuaded lawyers that he offered steadiness without passivity and reform without theatrics. Whether that coalition endures will depend not on campaign rhetoric but on how effectively he translates RIPE from manifesto to measurable governance.
The late Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga’s widow, Ida Odinga, has estimated her personal wealth at Sh500 million.
Appearing before the Departmental Committee on Defence, Intelligence and Foreign Relations on Friday, as she sought approval for her nomination as Kenya’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Ida made a distinction between her personal assets and those belonging to the wider Odinga family.
She emphasised that the figure she presented was strictly her own.
“There are things that belong to me, Ida, and there are things that belong to the family, but my net worth is about Sh500 million,” she said.
In the meeting, which ran for less than half an hour, Ida presented details of her academic training and professional experience as she sought to convince the Committee of her readiness for the assignment.
Outlining her vision, if confirmed, Ida emphasised the urgent need to tackle environmental degradation, cautioning that the nation’s long-term prosperity hinges on sustainable climate action.
“How we manage or mismanage our environment will determine the quality of life we live. Through my work, I will address the devastating effects of environmental degradation, especially on vulnerable people in society. This is a critical moment when we have the opportunity to shape our environmental future,” she added.
She also promised to advocate for Kenya’s and Africa’s priorities within the global environmental arena.
“I intend to help stop the destruction of our planet and pursue all related priorities. I will be keen to ensure that Kenya’s and Africa’s interests are represented and working together with other parties to see that the impact of these actions is not just high-level but reaching out to the grassroots level,” she stated.
In a heartfelt tribute, she paid respect to her late husband, Raila Odinga, acknowledging his unwavering support during their 52 years of marriage.
“I want to make a special mention of my biggest supporter, my recently departed husband, Raila Odinga. He immensely contributed to the person I am today,” she stated.
The Committee is now set to finalise its report and present it to the National Assembly for debate and approval.
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President Donald Trump warned Iran on Thursday it must make a deal over its nuclear program or “really bad things” will happen, and set a deadline of 10 to 15 days, drawing a threat from Tehran to retaliate against US bases in the region if attacked.
Amid a massive US military buildup in the Middle East that has fueled fears of a wider war, Trump said negotiations with Iran to end the tense standoff were going well but demanded that Tehran reach a “meaningful” agreement.
“Otherwise bad things happen,” Trump, who has repeatedly threatened to attack Iran, told the first meeting of his Board of Peace in Washington.
Trump spoke of the US airstrikes carried out in June, saying Iran’s nuclear potential had been “decimated,” adding “we may have to take it a step further or we may not.”
“You’ll be finding out over the next probably 10 days,” he said. Asked later to elaborate, he told reporters aboard Air Force One: “I would think that would be enough time, 10, 15 days, pretty much maximum.”
But he declined to be specific, except to warn again of “really bad things” and insist that Iran would have to make a deal one way or another.
In a letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, Tehran said it would not start any war but that “in the event that it is subjected to military aggression, Iran will respond decisively and proportionately” in its exercise of the right of self-defense.
“All bases, facilities, and assets of the hostile force in the region would constitute legitimate targets,” the letter said. “The United States would bear full and direct responsibility for any unpredictable and uncontrolled consequences.”
‘GOOD TALKS’: TRUMP
Trump’s threats to bomb Iran, with the two sides far apart in talks on Tehran’s nuclear program, have pushed up oil prices, and a Russian corvette warship on Thursday joined planned Iranian naval drills in the Gulf of Oman, a vital sea route for global energy.
Iranian and US negotiators met on Tuesday and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said they had agreed on “guiding principles.” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Wednesday, however, that the two sides remained apart on some issues.
Trump said “good talks are being had,” and a senior US official said Iran would make a written proposal on how to address US concerns.
Trump called on Tehran to join the US on the “path to peace.”
“They can’t have a nuclear weapon, it’s very simple,” he said. “You can’t have peace in the Middle East if they have a nuclear weapon.”
Iran has resisted making major concessions on its nuclear program, though insisting it is for peaceful purposes.
The US and Israel in the past have accused Tehran of trying to develop a nuclear bomb.
Trump’s latest saber-rattling came as he talked himself up as a man of peace in a long, meandering speech while hosting world leaders at the launch of his Board of Peace.
He proposed the body in September when he announced his plan to end Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.
He later expanded the board’s remit to tackle conflicts worldwide, prompting many key Western allies to stay away.
Earlier on Thursday, Russia warned against an “unprecedentedescalation of tension” around Iran on Thursday and urged restraint amid the US military buildup in the region, which a senior American official said should be complete by mid-March.
THREAT OF WAR
Trump has sent aircraft carriers, warships and jets to the region, raising the prospect of another attack on the Islamic Republic. The United States and Israel bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities and some military sites last June.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to discuss Iran on February 28, the senior US official said.
Washington wants Iran to entirely give up uranium enrichment, a process used to create fuel for atomic power plants but that can also provide material for a warhead.
The US and ally Israel also want Iran to give up long-range ballistic missiles, stop supporting groups around the Middle East and stop using force to quell internal protests.
Iran says it refuses to discuss issues beyond the atomic file, calling efforts to limit its missile arsenal a red line.
Satellite pictures have tracked both Iranian work to repair and fortify sites since last summer, showing work at both nuclear and missile sites, as well as preparations at US bases across the Middle East over the past month.
Iran’s joint exercise with Russia came days into an extended series of Iranian naval drills in the Gulf of Oman, with Iranian state television showing special forces units deployed on helicopters and ships.
In a sign of growing concern over the increased tensions, Poland on Thursday became the latest European country to urge its citizens to leave Iran, with Prime Minister Donald Tusk saying Poles may only have hours to evacuate.
Trump began threatening strikes on Iran again in January as Iranian authorities crushed widespread protests with deadly violence that left thousands dead across the country.
NAIROBI, Kenya — The voice note was brief. It was calm. And it would be the last time Susan Kuloba ever heard her son’s voice.
“Nawapenda sana, mkae poa,” David Shitanda told his mother in Swahili — I love you all very much, stay well — before disappearing into the fog of a war that had nothing to do with Kenya, and everything to do with a young man who had run out of options.
Hours later, he was dead.
Shitanda, affectionately known to his family as Davi, was killed in a missile strike while fighting for Russian forces in the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict. He was in his mid-twenties. The whereabouts of his body remain unknown.
His mother is still waiting.
The voice note, which has since been widely shared online and reduced thousands of Kenyans to tears, was not just a farewell. It was a business transaction born out of desperation. In the recording, Davi walks his mother through what to do if he does not come back alive.
“Hizo documents nimekutumia, kesho naenda mission na incase of anything utapigiwa simu uambiwe kama nimekufa ama kama nitakuwa uhai. Kama nitakuwa nimego utachukuwa hizo documents utapeleka kwa immigration ama kwa embassy utaclaim; utasema mimi ni mtoto wako kila kitu utapeana, kuna paychek utapatiwa, ule mwenye atainherit ni mzazi wangu,” he said.
He had sent her documents. He had arranged for a death payment. He had thought of everything except the possibility of surviving.
He did not survive.
From Lang’ata to the frontlines
Davi’s story did not begin in a war zone. It began in a schoolyard.
In 2015, pupils of Lang’ata Road Primary School poured into the streets in one of the most startling protests Kenya had ever seen. They were small children facing teargas, demonstrating against what they alleged was an attempt by then-Deputy President William Ruto to grab their school’s playground for the expansion of his Weston Hotel. The images of uniformed schoolchildren choking on teargas went around the world.
David Shitanda was one of those children.
He never completed secondary school. According to his mother, he sat his Kenya Certificate of Primary Education exams and immediately began fending for his family, too young to be carrying such weight but too poor to put it down. He worked construction sites in Nairobi. He tried his luck in Somalia. He spent time in Canada. Every road eventually brought him back to the same wall — the grinding reality of a country that had failed to build a future for him.
Last year, someone told him Russia was paying well. He went.
46 Kenyans. Two survivors.
A friend identified only as Karis, who was injured in the same strike that killed Davi, broke the news to Susan Kuloba in a text message that she later shared publicly.
“Am sorry David succumbed to a missile attack. We were together, I also got injuries. I’m in the hospital. I don’t know what to say, my heart is torn into pieces losing two friends at a go,” Karis wrote.
What followed was perhaps the most devastating detail of the entire story. According to information passed to Davi’s family, there were 46 Kenyans present during the attack. Only two walked away.
If the figure holds, it represents one of the single deadliest incidents involving Kenyan nationals in the entire conflict, a mass casualty event that unfolded thousands of kilometres from Nairobi without a single official statement from the Kenyan government before the day was out.
A crisis hiding in plain sight
Davi was not alone in making that journey. He was not even unusual.
A joint intelligence report compiled by Kenya’s National Intelligence Service and the Directorate of Criminal Investigations, tabled before Parliament this month, revealed that more than 1,000 Kenyan nationals have now been recruited to fight for the Russian army. The figure is five times higher than earlier estimates of around 200 Kenyans.
According to the report, many of the recruits were lured by unlicensed recruitment agencies and rogue middlemen who dangled promises of salaries as high as $35,000 upfront and $3,000 monthly.
Unemployed youth, former military personnel and ex-police officers were specifically targeted.
The recruiters used tourist visas routed through Istanbul and Abu Dhabi to funnel Kenyans into Russia, where, the report says, many found themselves in military training camps rather than the civilian jobs they had been promised.
Some had their passports confiscated. Some had their movements restricted. Some ended up on the frontlines with a weapon they had never asked to carry.
The Kenyan Embassy in Moscow had issued a public warning just four days before Davi was killed. The warning noted that many of those who reached out to the embassy had been promised employment, high salaries and residency arrangements that did not exist upon arrival. It urged Kenyans to verify job offers through official government channels and avoid travel arranged through social media or unlicensed agencies.
For Davi, the warning came too late.
“He fought against greedy leadership as a child”
Activist Boniface Mwangi, who helped amplify the story on social media Thursday morning, described Davi’s death as a damning indictment of the country’s political class.
“David Shitanda did not deserve to die so young, thousands of kilometers away from his home and family,” Mwangi wrote on X. “David’s brief life on earth personifies how Kenyan leadership is failing its youth. As a kid in primary school, he fought against greedy leadership. As an adult, the same failed leadership forced him to seek a livelihood in a foreign land, fighting and dying in another man’s war.”
The post drew more than 1,400 reactions within hours of being published.
For many Kenyans, the story struck a nerve not just because of its tragedy but because of its terrible symmetry. The same boy who once stood in a schoolyard demanding his right to a future had been driven by that future’s absence to die on a Ukrainian battlefield for a country not his own.
Susan Kuloba is yet to receive her son’s body. She is yet to receive any formal confirmation from Russian authorities. She has a set of documents her son sent her, a compensation claim she has been told to make, and a voice note she will never stop hearing.
“Nawapenda sana,” he told her. I love you all very much.
She loved him too.
Kenya Insights could not independently verify the casualty figures at the time of publication. The Russian Embassy in Nairobi denied issuing visas to Kenyans for the purpose of joining the military.
A Milimani court has acquitted a Moi University student accused of publishing a misleading image on X suggesting the death of President William Ruto, citing glaring gaps in the prosecution’s evidence.
Principal Magistrate Caroline Nyaguthi on Thursday freed David Mokaya under Section 215 of the Criminal Procedure Code after finding that the prosecution had failed to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.
Mokaya allegedly posted the image on his X (formerly Twitter) account, “Landlord @bozgabi,” on November 13, 2024, claiming it was of President William Ruto being transported.
The court was informed that the image, which depicted a casket draped in the Kenyan flag and escorted by military officers dressed in ceremonial uniforms, was fabricated to give the false impression that it involved the President.
In her judgment, the magistrate said the court had carefully considered submissions from both the prosecution and the defence, as well as the testimony of six prosecution witnesses. However, she found that none of the evidence conclusively linked Mokaya to the offending post.
“The prosecution failed to establish a nexus between the accused and the social media account in question,” the court ruled.
The magistrate noted that there was no forensic or digital evidence, such as login records or device data, to show that Mokaya authored or uploaded the post.
The court heard that Mokaya’s account was allegedly used for marketing purposes and was shared with three other individuals who were never called as witnesses.
This, the magistrate observed, created reasonable doubt as to who actually accessed or operated the account at the material time.
Further weakening the prosecution’s case was evidence on the accused’s location. While the alleged offence was said to have been committed in Nairobi, Mokaya resides in Eldoret and was arrested there.
The investigating officer admitted under cross-examination that he could not verify the origin, source, or geographic location of the post.
The officer also confirmed that the student’s personal data had been obtained from a mobile network provider, later identified in court as Safaricom.
However, he was unable to confirm whether the SIM card linked to the account had been properly registered or whether unverified numbers had been deregistered at the time.
The defence strongly challenged the integrity of the investigation, arguing that the prosecution failed to call key witnesses, including the complainant, and relied on unverified telecom data.
“If it is a very old number, anybody could have been issued one,” the defence submitted.
In a pointed remark, the magistrate faulted the decision to prosecute, warning that cases touching on the presidency must be handled with caution and free from public or political pressure.
She added that the court could not rule out the possibility that the post was fabricated.
The ruling has reignited debate on digital privacy, freedom of expression, and compliance with the Data Protection Act of 2019, which sets strict standards on the handling of personal data in Kenya.
Israel is preparing for the possibility of receiving a green light from the US to launch an attack on Iran’s ballistic missile system, the Israeli public broadcaster KAN said late Wednesday.
KAN noted that the scenario of Israel striking Iran’s ballistic missiles comes amid widespread focus on whether US President Donald Trump will order the attack on Iran.
Israeli security establishment assessments over the past 24 hours indicate a rising likelihood of a US attack on Iran, following the latest round of talks between Washington and Tehran, the Israeli daily Haaretz reported.
The daily added that “according to assessments by the security establishment and contrary to Iran’s public statements at the conclusion of the Geneva talks, significant gaps remain that the US is unable to bridge, particularly the demand that Iran abandon uranium enrichment on its own territory.”
“Given that the negotiations have reached a dead end, Israel expects Trump to resort to the military option within a shorter timeframe than anticipated in recent days,” it said.
It said that “in Israel, the possibility of the Israeli army taking an active role in fighting Iran is not being ruled out in the event of a US attack.”
The report noted that there is close coordination between the two countries in the fields of intelligence, information technology, military communications and air defense.
Oman mediated a round of negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program in Geneva on Tuesday, following a previous round hosted in Muscat on Feb. 6.
Israeli preparations come as US military deployments in the Middle East continue to increase amid US media reports that the Trump administration is nearing a major military confrontation with Iran, despite ongoing talks between Washington and Tehran.
According to information circulated by social media accounts that track and analyze flight data, the US has sent a large number of fighter jets, aerial refueling aircraft and Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft over the past 48 hours to its bases in Europe and the Middle East.
NAIROBI — They were told they would be security guards. One expected to work as a salesman. Another believed he was headed to Russia as a high-level athlete. Instead, all of them were handed weapons after three weeks of perfunctory military training and sent to the front lines of one of the bloodiest conflicts in modern European history.
More than 1,000 Kenyans have now been trafficked into Russia’s war against Ukraine, according to a classified joint report by the National Intelligence Service and the Directorate of Criminal Investigations that was tabled before Kenya’s National Assembly on Wednesday. The figure — far exceeding previous government estimates — has ignited a parliamentary firestorm and triggered demands for the exposure and prosecution of state officials who investigators say are complicit in what amounts to an industrial-scale human trafficking operation with blood on its hands.
The report, presented by National Assembly Majority Leader Kimani Ichung’wah, describes a criminal syndicate so deeply embedded in Kenya’s government apparatus that it has corrupted officers in immigration, the criminal investigations directorate, the anti-narcotics unit, the National Employment Authority and, most shockingly of all, staff inside both the Russian embassy in Nairobi and the Kenyan embassy in Moscow.
“Government offices are not to be used for criminal activities,” Ichung’wah told a hushed House. “Our embassy must be the place where Kenyans can seek refuge, not exploitation.”
The human toll documented in the report is stark. As of this month, 89 Kenyans remain on active front lines in eastern Ukraine. Thirty-nine are hospitalized. Twenty-eight are missing in action. Thirty-five remain confined to Russian military camps. At least 10 confirmed deaths have been recorded — a figure that separate tallies suggest could be as high as 18. Four Kenyans are currently held as prisoners of war in Ukrainian custody. One has completed his contract. One is detained.
The families of those men and women have been left to agonize in silence, some clutching photographs of sons and brothers who vanished months ago after telling relatives they were off to find work abroad.
A Recruitment Machine Hiding in Plain Sight
The operation, investigators found, was not improvised. It was systematic, well-funded and brazen.
Rogue recruitment agencies — at least one of them operating from a commercial address along Koinange Street in central Nairobi and hiding behind the branding of the government’s legitimate Kazi Majuu overseas employment initiative — have been actively head-hunting targets for the Russian military. Their preferred recruits: former Kenya Defence Forces personnel, ex-police officers and unemployed civilians between their mid-twenties and early fifties, men and women desperate enough to believe an offer that seemed, in hindsight, almost too good to be true.
The promised terms were extraordinary. Monthly salaries of approximately 350,000 Kenyan shillings. Signing bonuses ranging from 900,000 shillings to 1.2 million. And the ultimate carrot: eventual Russian citizenship for those who survived long enough to collect it.
What the recruits were not told was that the contracts they signed in Kenya — and countersigned with a shadowy overseas employment agency in Moscow — were written in Cyrillic, a script none of them could read. By the time they understood what they had agreed to, they were already in military camps.
“They are basically just giving you a gun to go and die,” Ichung’wah told Parliament, his voice tight with barely contained fury.
Victims paid as much as 1.6 million shillings in recruitment fees for the privilege of being trafficked. Bank accounts linked to key suspects have since been frozen. Passports, contracts and electronic communications have been recovered as evidence. Multiple arrests are expected.
A State Within the State
What has most alarmed lawmakers is not the existence of rogue private recruiters — those, at least, can be deregistered and prosecuted. What has alarmed them is the evidence that the network could not have operated without active protection from inside the Kenyan government itself.
According to the NIS-DCI report, colluding officials from the Directorate of Immigration Services, the DCI and the National Employment Authority facilitated the movement of recruits through Jomo Kenyatta International Airport without interception. Embassy staff in Moscow helped issue the visit visas that made the travel possible. When airport scrutiny intensified after earlier exposures, traffickers simply rerouted their human cargo through Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Africa, exploiting the region’s more porous border systems.
In September 2025, a DCI raid on Great Wall Apartments uncovered 22 victims aged between 24 and 38, being held under the supervision of two Kenyans operating on behalf of a Russian national. The Russian was arrested the following day — and deported back to Russia within 24 hours, raising immediate questions about whose interests were being protected and why justice moved so swiftly in his favor.
Ichung’wah demanded answers. “The Ministry of Interior, through the State Department for Immigration Services, must pinpoint the officers colluding with criminals. The same applies to the DCI and the National Employment Authority. Our ambassador in Moscow must identify the officers within the embassy that may have colluded with these criminals.”
Taita Taveta Woman Representative Lydia Haika, whose parliamentary committee has been flooded with complaints about overseas exploitation, noted that the National Employment Authority had blacklisted some agencies — but that many others continued to operate. “These are issues that come to our committee every day,” she said.
A Continent Being Harvested
Kenya’s crisis is not happening in isolation. Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said in November that Kyiv had identified at least 1,436 foreign nationals from 36 African countries fighting on Russia’s side, warning that the true number was almost certainly higher. A February 2026 report by INPACT, a Swiss-based investigative organization, identified 1,417 African men who since 2023 have signed formal contracts to enlist with Russian forces. Recruitment, the report found, has been accelerating steadily — rising from 177 cases in 2023 to 592 in 2024 and 647 in 2025.
Cameroon leads African nations in confirmed deaths, with between 94 and 96 of its nationals killed in combat. Kenya’s confirmed death toll, while officially lower, is almost certainly undercounted. Identifying and repatriating the dead has proven agonizingly difficult. Foreign Minister Musalia Mudavadi, who announced plans in February to visit Moscow to demand formal bilateral protections for Kenyan citizens, told the BBC that some bodies had been found in Ukrainian territory, requiring coordination with Kyiv even to begin the process of bringing the dead home.
Russia, for its part, has built an elaborate architecture of deception to sustain its African recruitment pipeline. A website called “Fight for Russia,” hosted on Russian servers and launched in January 2025, has carried online application forms for foreign volunteers. Social media campaigns run by influencers, many of them African fighters-turned-ambassadors for Russian military service, have been deployed to reach young men on the continent through platforms they already use daily. In some cases, the FSB, Russia’s federal security service, has been directly implicated in coordinating the networks.
For those who refuse the pitch or try to turn back after arriving, the choices are brutal. Illegal immigrants intercepted in Russia, the INPACT report found, are given two options: deportation, or a contract with the Russian army.
The Economy Behind the Desperation
Every parliamentarian who rose to speak on Wednesday returned, eventually, to the same uncomfortable truth: the traffickers are exploiting a real and desperate hunger for economic survival.
Funyula MP Wilberforce Oundo noted that Kenyans pursue manual and low-skilled jobs abroad not from recklessness but from extreme economic hardship. Baringo North MP Joseph Makilap called on the DCI and NIS to interrogate agencies suspected of sending Kenyans to conflict zones, and urged the government to create local reintegration pathways — farm work, vocational training — for those who have already returned, many of them traumatized, some amputated, some barely functioning.
“The only way we can save ourselves,” said Oundo, “is to continuously build this economy so each Kenyan can have a job. Otherwise, many young people end up maimed or dead in conflict zones.”
Ichung’wah echoed the warning, urging job seekers to verify overseas employment offers exclusively through licensed and regulated agencies. He reminded Kenyans that the Kazi Majuu program — the legitimate government initiative whose name and branding the traffickers have been stealing — exists precisely to provide verified overseas opportunities through channels that do not end in military camps in Kursk Oblast.
What Happens Next
Investigations are ongoing. Kenyan authorities say more arrests are imminent. Foreign Minister Mudavadi’s planned visit to Moscow, if it takes place, will seek a formal bilateral agreement barring the conscription of Kenyan nationals. Kenya has already deregistered more than 600 non-compliant recruitment agencies since the scandal broke.
But the parliamentary session on Wednesday made clear that accountability within the state itself remains the harder problem. Names have not yet been named. The rogue immigration officials, the complicit DCI officers, the embassy staff in Moscow — none have been publicly identified or charged.
Until they are, as Ichung’wah made plain, the pipeline remains open.
“They have made other Kenyans lose lives,” he said. “Others suffer in the battlefield. And the emotional turmoil that the families are going through.”
Outside Parliament, in houses across Nairobi and Kisumu and Eldoret and the Western counties, those families are still waiting for their sons to call.
Reporting contributed by correspondents in Nairobi. Additional information drawn from NIS-DCI intelligence findings presented to the National Assembly, statements by Kenya’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and reports by INPACT, France 24, The Washington Post, and Al Jazeera.
In the annals of Kenyan legal history, few institutions have carried the weight of Kaplan and Stratton Advocates with as much quiet authority as that firm has for decades.
Founded in the colonial era and now commanding a client portfolio that spans blue-chip corporations, international development banks, insurance conglomerates and the country’s wealthiest families, it has long projected an image of impeccable legal craftsmanship.
That image is now in serious jeopardy.
Within the space of a single week in February 2026, two senior partners of the same firm have found themselves at the centre of separate but thematically identical storms: allegations of document fraud, manufactured evidence and the manipulation of Kenya’s highest judicial processes for private gain.
The convergence of these two matters has sent tremors through the Nairobi bar and raised questions that will not be easily answered about the culture, oversight and accountability within one of the country’s most prestigious commercial law practices.
THE DEAD MAN’S SIGNATURE
The first and more advanced of the two matters concerns the estate of James Boro Karugu, Kenya’s second Attorney General, who died on November 9, 2022, aged 86. Karugu was, by every account, a man of towering legal intellect and fierce personal integrity.
He had resigned as Attorney General under President Daniel arap Moi on June 2, 1981, just fifteen months into the role, rather than bend his principles to the pressures of the administration.
He retreated to Kiamara, his coffee farm in Kiambu, named his holding company Mathara Holdings after the syllables of his late wife Margaret Githara’s name, and spent four decades quietly building one of the most substantial private estates in the country’s history.
That estate, when it came to be contested in the courts, encompassed over 753 acres of land spread across Nairobi, Nakuru, Murang’a, Kwale and Kiambu Counties, Treasury bonds valued at Sh404.7 million, shares in Kenya Power, Nation Media Group and Maramba Holdings, as well as a commercial building along Kenyatta Avenue in Nairobi’s central business district. Control of Mathara Holdings and its ten subsidiaries forms the beating heart of the dispute.
Weeks after Karugu was buried at his Kiamara farm, a will dated April 2, 2014 was presented to family members at a hotel in Kiambu.
Alongside it came a trust deed establishing the JBK Foundation, a vehicle that, if recognised by the courts, would place the entirety of Karugu’s assets not directly distributed by the will into a trust administered by named executors. The documents were unknown to the family during the former AG’s lifetime and emerged only after his burial.
Victoria Nyambura Karugu, the former Attorney General’s firstborn daughter, who had managed the family’s business affairs as Chief Executive of Mathara Holdings after her father’s dementia took hold in 2015, was having none of it.
She told investigators the documents were fabrications.
She pointed to a 2010 will drawn up by Patel and Patel Advocates as representing her father’s authentic last wishes. And she lodged a formal complaint with the Directorate of Criminal Investigations.
What followed that complaint was, by the account of investigators, one of the more disturbing forensic discoveries in recent Kenyan legal history.
Chief Inspector Duncan Maina, acting on behalf of the DPP and the DCI, filed an affidavit in the High Court detailing how forensic examiners discovered that the questioned documents bore grammatical errors, arithmetic mistakes, spelling blunders and erratic page numbering suggesting the documents had been assembled from multiple sources.
The execution page allegedly bore deliberate obscurity concealing its page number, raising red flags about tampering.
“The impugned Will and Trust Deed as presented bear several drafting concerns that do not resonate with professional standards of a man of the stature of the deceased, an impeccable lawyer and second Attorney General of the Republic of Kenya,” investigators stated in their affidavit. The initials appearing on all pages of the two questioned documents, attributed to Karugu, were declared a forgery.
Witnesses gave conflicting accounts of the will’s execution, with some admitting they signed on different days. Crucially, none could confirm witnessing the settlor or other trustees sign the document, a fundamental requirement for valid execution.
One of the petitioners initially resisted producing the original documents for forensic examination before eventually surrendering copies. The examiner found that the questioned initials and signatures were not those of James Boro Karugu.
On December 23, 2025, the Director of Public Prosecutions approved charges for forgery, uttering false documents and conspiracy to defraud. Six individuals were to face prosecution.
Among those named were Karugu’s son Eric Mwaura Karugu, Jane Wangechi Kabiu, William Kimani Richu, Eliud Mwaura Gatambia, Joshua Mwaura Kimani and lawyer Peter Mbuthia Gachuhi, a senior partner at Kaplan and Stratton.
THE LAWYER WHO BARELY KNEW THE MAN
The inclusion of Peter Mbuthia Gachuhi in the list of suspects is not simply sensational. It is, to those who have followed this succession battle, the logical culmination of a pattern that Nyambura Karugu had been pointing to for some time.
Gachuhi, together with Joshua Mwaura Kimani and Eliud Mwaura Gatambia, had filed a petition for a grant of probate on July 5, 2023, through Kaplan and Stratton Advocates, seeking permission for the three to execute the contested will.
Nyambura alleged that Gachuhi had met her father only once in the eight years preceding his death, was not present at his funeral or memorial service, and was not a close friend or confidant of the former Attorney General.
She further alleged a conflict of interest with damning precision.
Gachuhi and Kaplan and Stratton had previously represented Karugu in 2016 when Lucy Githire Muthoni claimed to have been married to the former Attorney General.
The firm was also instructed in a similar claim by another woman, Wambui Mwangi. In that matter, they were instructed to deny all claims but also to seek a settlement confirming that Muthoni and Karugu had never been married.
For Nyambura, a lawyer who had represented the man in such intimate personal matters and was now presenting himself as the executor of the man’s estate under a will of highly questionable authenticity presented a conflict that went well beyond the merely procedural.
In a separate affidavit filed in the constitutional petition proceedings, Nyambura alleged that the motive of Senior Counsel Fred Ojiambo and Kaplan and Stratton was to be found in what she described as a very profitable retainer by the purported executors of the forged will and trust deed.
Lawyer Fred Ojiambo.
She argued that the assets of the deceased would be placed under the direct control of Kaplan and Stratton until their full depletion, to the grave prejudice of the legitimate beneficiaries.
THE ATTEMPT TO SILENCE THE STATE
When it became clear that prosecution was imminent, the six suspects moved.
On January 19, 2026, they secured ex parte conservatory orders from the High Court, restraining the DPP and the DCI from summoning, arresting or charging them in relation to the will.
The orders were obtained, according to lawyers representing Nyambura, shortly before the suspects were due to be arraigned. Murgor and Murgor Advocates wrote to the DPP characterising the timing as deliberate and designed to pre-empt imminent prosecution.
The letter also accused Fred Ojiambo of previously obstructing investigations by declining to produce the original will for forensic examination.
In correspondence dated May 12, 2025, Ojiambo had reportedly claimed that the document was being held by his firm under the authority of the succession court, a claim the complainant’s lawyers characterised as false.
They argued that no court order existed authorising the firm to withhold the document and that the conduct amounted to interference with lawful investigations.
When the matter came before Justice Bahati Mwamuye, it was Ojiambo himself who appeared in court on behalf of Gachuhi and the other petitioners.
He told the court he had not been served with the relevant documents. The judge directed that the matter be mentioned on March 16 for further directions.
The Attorney General, Dorcas Oduor, has now formally entered the arena on the side of the prosecution.
In grounds of opposition dated February 17, 2026, she urged the Constitutional and Human Rights Division of the High Court to dismiss the petition by Gachuhi and his co-petitioners, arguing that criminal investigations cannot be stopped merely because succession proceedings are ongoing.
The State was blunt in its characterisation of the petition.
It described the application seeking conservatory orders as incompetent, misconceived and an abuse of the court process.
It argued that the existence of High Court Succession Cause No. E916 of 2023 does not bar investigators from probing whether criminal offences were committed. It reminded the court that the Family Division has no jurisdiction to determine criminal culpability, including offences such as forgery.
The AG stated that forgery is a criminal offence under the Penal Code and cannot be resolved in a family or succession court, adding that the existence of a succession case does not stop criminal investigations.
THE SECOND STORM: TUJU AND THE BILLION-SHILLING PROPERTY
Before the ink had dried on the Attorney General’s opposition papers in the Karugu matter, the firm found itself facing a second and separately explosive allegation.
On February 16, 2026, former Cabinet Secretary and Jubilee Party Secretary General Raphael Tuju walked into DCI headquarters and formally recorded a criminal complaint against Senior Counsel Fred Ojiambo, the most senior lawyer at Kaplan and Stratton and the very same advocate who had appeared in court the previous day to defend Gachuhi.
Raphael Tuju.
At the centre of Tuju’s complaint is a prime property in Karen valued at Ksh 1.5 billion.
The dispute traces its origins to a commercial loan extended by the East African Development Bank to Tuju’s company, Dari Ltd, and enforcement proceedings the bank subsequently initiated against the property.
What began as a loan dispute has, in Tuju’s account, metastasised into something far more sinister.
Tuju told journalists outside DCI headquarters that he had written to the DCI ten days prior to personally presenting himself and had arrived bearing what he described as documentary evidence of criminal conduct by Ojiambo.
At the core of his allegations was a claim that Ojiambo and other advocates at the firm had procured and manufactured falsehoods from a former Kenya Country Manager of the East African Development Bank and deposited those fabricated falsehoods in sworn affidavits filed before both the High Court and the Supreme Court of Kenya.
He alleged the affidavits were presented as having been properly commissioned before a Commissioner for Oaths when they were no such thing.
If that allegation is established, it would mean that sworn documents presented to Kenya’s apex court were fraudulent.
Tuju also alleged that Ojiambo had persuaded the High Court to recognise a diplomatic immunity claim on behalf of the East African Development Bank, an immunity that Tuju flatly asserts does not exist in law, thereby freezing a separate criminal matter before the Magistrates Court for over a year.
Most dramatically, he told investigators of what he described as a fake international warrant of arrest emanating from a Ugandan magistrate’s court and deployed against him as an instrument of intimidation.
Ojiambo, reached for comment, dismissed the allegations with equanimity. “We haven’t falsified any affidavit on any matter whatsoever,” he said. He maintained he was unaware of the specifics of Tuju’s complaint at the time but denied categorically that he or his firm had engaged in any of the alleged conduct.
Tuju was not prepared to extend the same courtesy.
Standing outside DCI headquarters with his lawyer Duncan Okach at his side, he delivered what has since become one of the most quoted lines in recent Kenyan legal discourse. “Fred Ojiambo is a Bible-carrying fraud with a fake British accent,” he declared.
He then deliberately drew a line between the two crises afflicting the same firm.
He noted that Gachuhi, his colleague at Kaplan and Stratton, was already facing prosecution over the alleged forgery of former Attorney General Karugu’s will and asked, pointedly, what this said about the institution they both called home.
“If this can happen to persons like the late former AG James Boro Karugu and me, who have had the privilege of serving this country in high office, what is the situation for other Kenyans who cannot afford to engage teams of lawyers?” Tuju said.
A FIRM UNDER THE LENS
Kaplan and Stratton has not issued any formal institutional statement in response to either matter. The firm’s website continues to list both Ojiambo and Gachuhi among its senior practitioners without amendment.
Ojiambo is described as Senior Partner and Gachuhi as Partner, with his practice areas spanning civil litigation, banking, competition law and arbitration. He was admitted to the bar in 1990 and is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators.
The convergence of these allegations against practitioners of the same firm within a single week has raised uncomfortable questions for Kenya’s legal establishment that go beyond the guilt or innocence of any individual.
They touch on the adequacy of internal governance structures within large commercial law firms, the conflicts of interest that can arise when a firm simultaneously advises an individual client and later seeks to profit from that client’s estate, and the capacity of Kenya’s criminal justice system to hold members of the bar to the same standard it holds everyone else.
The Law Society of Kenya has not publicly commented on either matter.
WHAT COMES NEXT
The constitutional petition filed by Gachuhi and his co-petitioners is scheduled for further directions before Justice Bahati Mwamuye on March 16, 2026. The succession cause concerning Karugu’s estate is also due for mention in March.
The DCI complaint by Tuju against Ojiambo is at the investigative stage, and no charges have been preferred. Both Ojiambo and Gachuhi are entitled to the presumption of innocence and have denied wrongdoing.
But the trajectory of both matters is clear enough. The State has made its position known. The Attorney General has described the attempt to halt the Karugu prosecution as an abuse of process.
The DCI has before it a formal complaint implicating a Senior Counsel in manufactured affidavits placed before the Supreme Court.
And two daughters of a man once described as Kenya’s most principled Attorney General are watching a legal institution attempt to inherit their father’s empire.
For James Boro Karugu, the barefoot boy who once sat in the gallery of the High Court mesmerised by men in white wigs, the irony is one that history will not easily forgive.
Allegations reported in this article are contested and subject to ongoing judicial proceedings. All parties are presumed innocent unless and until found guilty by a court of competent jurisdiction.
Senior managers at Kenya Pipeline Company are under mounting pressure after a procurement tribunal ruled that the State corporation unlawfully cancelled a Sh292.9 million tender for the inspection of its critical Mombasa–Nairobi fuel pipeline, exposing what the watchdog described as procedural flaws and weak justification at the highest levels.
In a decision that has sent shockwaves through the energy sector, the Public Procurement Administrative Review Board ordered KPC to reinstate the $2.27 million contract for in-line inspection services on Line 5, a 450-kilometre, 20-inch multi-product pipeline that ferries billions of litres of fuel inland each year.
The Board found that KPC’s termination of the tender was unlawful and procedurally flawed, dismissing claims by the company that there were material governance issues in the bidding documents.
The ruling places senior management, including Managing Director Joe Sang, in the spotlight over what critics say is a pattern of opaque procurement decisions at one of the country’s most strategic State corporations.
At the heart of the dispute is a September 2025 tender for high-resolution intelligent Magnetic Flux Leakage and geometry inspection of the ageing pipeline, a sophisticated integrity assessment designed to detect corrosion, metal loss and structural defects before they escalate into catastrophic leaks.
Eleven firms submitted bids. Strategic Corporate Consultants Limited emerged as the lowest evaluated bidder at $2.27 million, inclusive of taxes. According to documents presented before the tribunal, an initial professional opinion endorsed the award in November.
But in December, the Managing Director rejected the recommendation, citing alleged inconsistencies between subcontracting clauses in the Instructions to Tenderers and mandatory requirements in the bid document.
A subsequent addendum recommended re-tendering, and a second professional opinion in January proposed outright termination. Bidders were then informed that the procurement had been cancelled due to ambiguities that allegedly made a lawful award impossible.
Strategic Corporate Consultants challenged the decision, arguing that KPC had issued clarifications before bid closure and could not retroactively invalidate the process after declaring it the lowest evaluated bidder.
In its ruling, the Board rejected KPC’s argument that Clause 4.4 and Mandatory Requirement No. 13 were contradictory. It held that a wholesome reading of the provisions showed they were complementary. Clause 4.4 permitted non-bidding firms to subcontract across multiple bids, while the mandatory requirement restricted multiple engagements only where the main contractor was foreign.
By cancelling the tender on grounds the Board deemed unsubstantiated, KPC was found to have failed to comply with statutory procurement procedures designed to ensure fairness, transparency and accountability in public spending.
The case unfolds against the backdrop of rising operational stakes for the company. KPC’s throughput volumes rose six per cent in 2024 to over nine million cubic metres, reflecting growing demand for fuel transport along the Northern Corridor.
The integrity of the Mombasa–Nairobi pipeline is therefore not merely technical but central to national energy security and regional trade.
Energy analysts warn that delays in conducting in-line inspection increase operational risk.
Intelligent pigging surveys using Magnetic Flux Leakage tools are globally recognised as a primary safeguard against corrosion-related failures in high-pressure pipelines.
Kenya has in the past suffered costly spills and product losses linked to infrastructure weaknesses, including major leaks in Thange and other sections that triggered environmental damage and compensation claims.
The tribunal’s intervention now raises uncomfortable questions about internal controls at KPC. Was the cancellation a genuine governance concern or a misreading of tender provisions? Why was an endorsed award reversed after evaluation had been completed? And what due diligence did senior management undertake before terminating a multi-million shilling procurement process?
Procurement law specialists note that termination of a tender at such an advanced stage is a serious administrative action that must be backed by clear legal grounds. Where such grounds are absent, it exposes public entities to litigation, reputational damage and delays in critical infrastructure maintenance.
For a State corporation that has in recent years embarked on refinery upgrades, storage expansion and capacity enhancement, the optics are troubling. KPC operates in a capital-intensive sector where investor confidence and lender scrutiny hinge on governance discipline.
The Board’s ruling effectively resets the process and compels the company to proceed in accordance with the law. But the political and managerial consequences may linger far longer.
As Parliament intensifies oversight of State corporations and the Treasury pushes for tighter procurement compliance, the Sh292 million inspection tender could become a test case of whether accountability mechanisms in Kenya’s public sector are finally biting at the top.
For now, the question hanging over KPC’s senior management is stark. In a company entrusted with the arteries of the nation’s fuel supply, how did a routine integrity inspection contract spiral into a procurement debacle now etched into the public record.
