Kenya Insights

Tag: Mombasa Cement

  • Cement, Cash and Courts: How the Hashu Dynasty Crushed the Ramji Brothers for Fourteen Years and Why the Walls Are Now Closing In

    Cement, Cash and Courts: How the Hashu Dynasty Crushed the Ramji Brothers for Fourteen Years and Why the Walls Are Now Closing In

    WHEN HARISH RAMJI walked out of a Nairobi magistrate’s court in late 2025 after a judge threw out the case against him as a nullity, he had already been arrested, publicly branded a forger and a fraudster, dragged through every level of the Kenyan judicial system, and drained of money that most Kenyan families would not see in a generation. He had also just beaten one of the most resourced industrial families in East Africa. The problem for the Hashu dynasty of Mombasa Cement is that Harish, his brother Bharat, and youngest sibling Ashvin were not broken. They were sharpened.

    The saga that led to that moment began not in 2025 but in 2010, when three Kenyan-Asian brothers who had purchased a 7.4-acre parcel of land in Mavoko, Machakos County from the National Social Security Fund filed suit against Mombasa Cement Limited, which claimed the same piece of earth. At the time, Mombasa Cement was the expanding industrial crown jewel of Hasmukh Kanji Patel, popularly known as Hasu, a cement billionaire whose name was synonymous with charitable giving along Kenya’s coast. The disparity between the two sides could not have been more stark. On one side: a family of three brothers with a sale agreement dated December 2006 and a title in their names. On the other: one of the most politically connected industrialists in the country, a man who fed thousands of the poor daily, built schools, paid hospital bills, erected city sculptures, and enjoyed the company of Cabinet Secretaries, county governors, and opposition kingpins at his table.

    What followed was not merely litigation. It was, by every credible account available in court records and testimony from people familiar with the matter, a fourteen-year campaign designed to grind the Ramjis into financial ruin, social disgrace and criminal jeopardy. The outcome, confirmed by Kenya’s highest courts, proved that their title was valid. The question that lingers over the Hashu empire — now navigating a post-patriarch era after Hasu Patel’s unexpected death in August 2024 at the age of fifty-eight — is how much damage was deliberately done along the way, and who must now answer for it.

    THE LAND AND THE CLAIM

    The origins of the dispute lie in a land-sale programme that the National Social Security Fund ran in Mavoko in the early 2000s, offloading large parcels it held in what would become a contested and litigated stretch of Machakos County. Mombasa Cement entered the picture early. Court records show the company acquired a fifty-acre parcel, LR number 27159, in September 2004 and was subsequently offered an adjoining 7.4-acre piece, LR number 11895/50, which abutted its growing industrial footprint. By September 2006, the company had paid a ten percent deposit on that second parcel, eventually settling the full balance two years later. In their version of events, that money secured them a right of ownership.

    The Ramji brothers tell a different story, one backed by a sale agreement they signed with the NSSF in December 2006. The complication that allowed both claims to flourish simultaneously was a third party — a company called Harp Investco — that also claimed interest in NSSF land in Mavoko and filed a High Court case that froze multiple pending sales. A consent judgment in June 2010 purported to resolve the web of competing claims by allowing buyers to proceed. It was on the basis of that consent that Mombasa Cement said it finalised its payment, at a renegotiated price of Sh8.7 million. The Ramji brothers argue, and the Court of Appeal ultimately agreed, that their independent purchase, made through a valid process and supported by their own documentation, gave them the superior title.

    Crucially, Mombasa Cement never produced a direct sale agreement between itself and the NSSF for the 7.4-acre parcel. The Ramjis did. That absence would become central to every court that subsequently examined the dispute, but not before the Hashu machine had spent years burying the brothers under procedural rubble.

    “The office of Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Kenya Railways is a public office that must at all times be exercised in accordance with the Constitution and the principles of good governance.”

    THE LONG SIEGE: 2010 TO 2019

    The Ramjis filed their civil suit against Mombasa Cement in 2010 with a straightforward claim of ownership. What followed was anything but straightforward. People familiar with the litigation describe a relentless pattern of procedural delays, multiple applications, and manoeuvres that kept the case from resolution while Mombasa Cement’s operations continued to encroach on the disputed parcel. For nine years, the brothers waited for the Environment and Land Court to deliver its judgment. When it came in 2019, it dismissed their case entirely.

    The manner of that dismissal drew private disbelief from legal observers. The brothers had filed their documentary evidence. The cement company had not produced the one document that would have confirmed its claim above theirs: a direct NSSF sale agreement. Yet the court found in Mombasa Cement’s favour. The brothers appealed immediately. The Court of Appeal would take another four years to speak. What happened in the space between the 2019 defeat and the 2023 reversal forms the most explosive chapter of this story.

    Sources close to the Ramji camp describe an atmosphere during those years that went well beyond ordinary litigation pressure. Claims circulated, backed by what these sources describe as traceable expenditure, that money was moving from the Mombasa Cement side to people capable of influencing outcomes, including officers within law enforcement. Whether or not those specific allegations are ever proven in the criminal proceedings the brothers are now pursuing, the result of the overall period was undeniable: the Ramjis were exhausted, financially strained, and facing the prospect of permanent loss of a Sh350 million asset on which they had legitimate papers.

    Ramji Brothers.
    Ramji Brothers.

    THE FORGED FORGERY: HOW ARRESTS BECAME A WEAPON

    The criminal strand of this story requires particular scrutiny. While the civil dispute was still live, allegations emerged that the Ramji brothers had forged NSSF documents to back their ownership claim. These allegations, which Mombasa Cement’s camp pushed with considerable energy, were never findings made by the civil courts examining the same documents. In December 2023, a three-judge Court of Appeal bench comprising Justices Patrick Kiage, Kathurima M’Inoti and Francis Tuiyott delivered a landmark ruling affirming the Ramjis as rightful owners. The court examined the discrepancies in their documentation and found them attributable to clerical error, not fraud. The judges traced the process of acquisition and found it favoured the Ramji family.

    That should have been the end. It was not. In January 2024, a complaint surfaced at DCI headquarters, originating from the NSSF, asserting that the Ramjis had fraudulently obtained title to land the NSSF regarded as its own. The timing was remarkable. The complaint came barely a month after the Court of Appeal had vindicated the brothers, and a month before Mombasa Cement would attempt to take the matter to the Supreme Court. Investigators nevertheless pressed ahead. The Ramjis sought orders from the Kiambu High Court to block their prosecution. Justice Dorah Chepkwony dismissed that petition in July 2024, holding that the investigation was ongoing and that the brothers should present their evidence in criminal proceedings. The brothers appealed. In a brief but significant ruling, Justices Jessie Lesiit and John Mativo noted that the forgery allegations had in fact arisen and been addressed in the Court of Appeal proceedings, and that the existence of a final appellate judgment dismissing those allegations constituted exceptional circumstances.

    Mombasa Cement continued to call for the prosecution to proceed. It filed papers before the Court of Appeal characterising the brothers’ attempts to stop the criminal case as an abuse of court process. Then came September 2024: the Supreme Court delivered its ruling, dismissing Mombasa Cement’s application to escalate the civil dispute upward. The apex court found no new question of general public importance warranting its intervention. The Ramjis were confirmed as the owners. A fourteen-year civil war had ended in their favour at every meaningful level.

    Yet in December 2025, the DCI arrested all three brothers. They were charged with conspiracy to defraud, making a false document, obtaining registration by false pretences, and forgery. Their lawyers pointed to the September 2024 Court of Appeal order that had barred arrests and prosecutions related to the property while appellate proceedings remained active. The magistrate who eventually heard the matter threw the case out as a nullity. But the damage had already been done: public arrests, the spectacle of charges, and media coverage that had for years branded the brothers as suspects in a case the civil courts had already ruled upon.

    PHILANTHROPY AS POLITICAL COVER

    Understanding how Mombasa Cement sustained its position through years of adverse evidence requires an understanding of the Hasu Patel brand and the political architecture around it. Hasmukh Patel was not a conventional tycoon. He built visible goodwill on a staggering scale. His Sahajanand Feeding Centre in Mombasa was estimated to feed up to a thousand people a day. He ran scholarship programmes that put over ten thousand learners through school. He paid hospital bills for strangers. He erected sculptures along Mombasa’s roads and funded environmental beautification projects. When he died suddenly in August 2024, the funeral procession brought Mombasa City to a standstill. Cabinet Secretaries delivered condolences on behalf of the President. Opposition leader Kalonzo Musyoka attended personally. In death, as in life, the Hasu brand delivered extraordinary political insulation.

    But that insulation had limits, and they were always most visible at the coast’s edges. In Kilifi County, where Mombasa Cement built its main clinker factory at Vipingo, a different narrative competed with the philanthropist story. Local residents and their MPs repeatedly accused the company of acquiring land under questionable processes. Parliamentary committees investigated. In 2015, a committee directed managing director Hasmukh Patel to appear personally before it in Nairobi over questions about 1,233 acres the company held at Vipingo, which residents accused it of having wrested from ancestral owners through illegal procedures. In 2023, approximately five hundred machete-carrying youths invaded part of the Vipingo Sisal farm along the Mombasa-Malindi Highway, claiming the land belonged to their forefathers and that sisal estate leases had expired. Residents filed title deeds they said authenticated their claims, and human rights organisations accused the company of deploying fake title deeds to enforce its ownership.

    A parliamentary committee sided with critics of the acquisition, recommending the nullification of Mombasa Cement’s titles, directly contradicting the National Land Commission which had cleared the 2005 purchase from Vipingo Estate Limited at Sh68 million. Sources alleged that NLC chairman Mohammed Swazuri’s relationship with Hasu Patel gave the cement company an advantage in that acquisition. Swazuri was later acquitted in a separate Sh221 million land case, but his tenure at the NLC was itself one of the most scandal-tainted in Kenyan parastatal history.

    The Mombasa County government separately fell into open war with Mombasa Cement during this same period. The county moved to oversee and regulate Patel’s charitable donations at public hospitals, a move the tycoon and his company regarded as an intrusion. The response was extraordinary: Mombasa Cement physically removed sculptures it had installed at city roundabouts and carted them to Kilifi County in what observers widely characterised as retaliation. A billionaire was pulling art off public roundabouts in a grudge match with a county governor. In a normal environment, that episode alone would have generated the kind of sustained scrutiny the company never quite received.

    THE FAMILY IN PIECES

    While Mombasa Cement pursued the Ramji brothers through the courts, the Hashu family’s internal affairs were generating their own litigation. Court records from Mombasa reveal a succession dispute involving the estate of Hasmukh’s late elder brother, Arvind Kanji Premji Patel, who died in 2013. Arvind and Hasmukh were co-directors and co-shareholders in multiple companies, including Corrugated Sheets Limited, Vishnu Holdings Limited, Standard Rolling Mills Limited, Venus Metals Developers Limited and Vishna Investment Limited, as well as Mombasa Cement and Tororo Cement in Uganda. The combined value of those interests ran into billions.

    The complication arose from a woman named Moza Abdillahi, who bore Arvind two children during an extramarital relationship while she worked at one of the family companies. Moza and her twins subsequently claimed their share of Arvind’s estate. Her legal team accused Hasmukh of having forged Arvind’s will, arguing that Arvind was not in a sound mental or physical state when the document was executed. The irony of a man whose own legal campaign against the Ramji brothers centred on allegations of document forgery then facing his own will-forgery accusations before a court is the kind of detail that the Hashu family would very much prefer to stay buried in court archives.

    Hasmukh died before that succession dispute was publicly resolved. His death in August 2024 came barely five months after the family hosted a grand wedding in Nyali for his son Dhruv Hasmukh Patel, who now serves as a director of Mombasa Cement. Reports from the wedding described the kind of extravagance that belongs to a different universe from the Mavoko brothers they were simultaneously prosecuting: the internationally renowned Tanzanian entertainer Diamond Platnumz was flown in at fees estimated in the multi-millions. Mombasa’s business and political establishment turned out. The celebration was a statement of permanence and power. It was also, in retrospect, the last significant public display of the undiluted Hashu era.

    THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE

    The Ramji brothers are not the same men who first walked into the Environment and Land Court in 2010 with straightforward papers and reasonable expectations of a fair hearing. Fourteen years of litigation, two criminal arrests, reputational destruction, and financial attrition have not produced compliance. They have produced a calculated campaign of counter-accountability.

    Through senior counsel Nelson Havi, the brothers filed a constitutional petition naming DCI Director Mohamed Amin and DPP Director Douglas Kanja as respondents, accusing both of gross abuse of power, violation of their fundamental rights, and defiance of binding court decisions by sanctioning their arrest and prosecution after the dispute had been settled by superior courts. The petition seeks declarations that both officials are unfit to hold public office and demands that they jointly pay Sh300 million in damages for the rights violations alleged. In separate proceedings, the brothers are separately seeking Sh300 million from the DPP and DCI, bringing their total damages claim to Sh600 million.

    In parallel, the Ramjis are preparing private criminal proceedings targeting Mombasa Cement’s director Dhruv Hasmukh Patel and CEO Bhadra Shah over trespass on the Mavoko parcel and related offences. Those proceedings would, if they proceed to trial, represent a direct inversion of the story that Mombasa Cement spent over a decade constructing: that the Ramjis were the criminals, the forgers, the usurpers. Instead, the company’s own current leadership would sit in the position of accused.

    The criminal case the magistrate threw out as a nullity has not been forgotten. The brothers’ lawyers have pointed publicly to what they describe as the extraordinary alignment between Mombasa Cement’s Supreme Court defeat in September 2024 and the DCI’s decision to move against the brothers in December 2025, arguing that the sequence suggests coordination designed to frustrate the implementation of the courts’ findings. The DCI’s position, that the September 2025 NSSF complaint triggered an independent criminal investigation with forensic backing, has not satisfied the brothers or their counsel, who note that the NSSF’s involvement in a matter where NSSF documentation forms the core of the civil case raises its own questions about who was directing that complaint and why.

    WHAT THE RECORDS REVEAL ABOUT MOMBASA CEMENT’S STRATEGY

    Reviewing the full litigation trail, a pattern emerges that experienced commercial litigators in Kenya recognise immediately. When a well-resourced party knows its underlying claim is weak, the most effective legal strategy is not to win on the merits but to outlast the opponent. File applications at every junction. Appeal unfavourable procedural rulings. Open parallel fronts in multiple courts. Deploy criminal proceedings to drain the opponent’s finances and management attention, and to generate negative publicity that poisons public perception while civil hearings remain pending. Every element of that playbook appears in the record of Mombasa Cement’s engagement with the Ramji brothers.

    The company filed papers characterising the brothers’ attempts to defend themselves as an abuse of court process, a framing that, had it been accepted, would have left them unable to challenge the criminal proceedings at all. It opposed their applications at every turn, insisting that the forgery investigation was independent of the civil dispute even after the Court of Appeal had examined and dismissed forgery allegations in the same matter. When the Supreme Court closed the door on civil escalation in September 2024, a complaint appeared at DCI headquarters the same month from the NSSF, and arrests followed fifteen months later.

    None of this proves, on its own, that specific Mombasa Cement officials directed law enforcement action against the Ramjis. What it establishes, through the public record, is that every major escalation in the criminal dimension of this case followed a major setback for Mombasa Cement in the civil dimension. Coincidences, in Kenyan corporate litigation, have a tendency to cluster in patterns that only benefit one side.

    THE EMPIRE AFTER HASU

    The sudden death of Hasmukh Patel in August 2024 from what his family spokesman described as stomach pains removed the individual whose name, personal relationships, and charitable empire had provided Mombasa Cement with a level of political protection that no corporate strategy alone could replicate. Hasu’s relationships with Governor Abdulswamad Nassir, with Wiper’s Kalonzo Musyoka, with the coast political establishment from MP level upward, were personal bonds built over decades of community investment. His son Dhruv and CEO Bhadra Shah, whatever their individual capabilities, inherited a corporation carrying the weight of those relationships without the man who built them.

    The company now faces the Ramji brothers’ counteroffensive without Hasu’s protective halo. It faces the community land pressures at Vipingo without his ability to personally charm parliamentary committees into paralysis. It faces scrutiny of its acquisition history without the philanthropic narrative that historically deflected uncomfortable questions. And it faces all of this while managing an internal succession dispute over the assets of the late Arvind Patel that has yet to reach final resolution, with Moza Abdillahi and her children still pressing their claims through the courts.

    CEO Bhadra Shah has in recent years cultivated her own high-profile charitable initiatives, generating positive media coverage that mirrors the pattern Hasu Patel established. Private observers have raised pointed questions about the function of such giving in a company with Mombasa Cement’s tax profile and land-acquisition history, but those questions have not yet found a sustained public hearing.

    WHAT HAPPENS NEXT

    The Ramji brothers’ damages petitions against the DPP and DCI are live. Their intended private criminal proceedings against Dhruv Hasmukh Patel and Bhadra Shah are at an advanced preparatory stage. The Mavoko parcel, confirmed by courts from the Court of Appeal to the Supreme Court as theirs, remains physically occupied by Mombasa Cement’s infrastructure, making the question of actual possession the next frontier of this battle. Trespass proceedings, if the brothers file and pursue them effectively, would force Mombasa Cement to either vacate industrial infrastructure it has operated for years on land a court has said belongs to three Kenyan-Asian brothers, or pay damages that could be substantial.

    For anyone watching Kenya’s accountability landscape, the trajectory of this case matters beyond the specific interests of the parties. It asks whether the systematic weaponisation of law enforcement against a legitimate property owner by a corporate adversary has consequences for those who did the weaponising, not only for those who survived it. It asks whether the DCI and DPP can be held financially accountable for deploying their powers on behalf of parties who have already lost in the courts whose authority those institutions are meant to enforce, not undermine.

    It also asks a question that Kenyans in business and outside it know from experience but rarely see posed this directly: when a billionaire’s philanthropy becomes the mechanism for avoiding accountability, what happens when the billionaire dies?

    For Harish, Bharat and Ashvin Ramji, the answer is becoming clear. The machine that spent fourteen years trying to bury them is now running without its most powerful component. The brothers are not celebrating. They are filing. And in Kenya’s courts, a company that once weaponised criminal law against three brothers who dared to hold a legitimate title now finds those same brothers using the same courts to come for its directors, its CEO and the state officials they allege were deployed against them.

    The Hashu empire is not finished. It is too large, too embedded in the coast’s commercial fabric, and too strategically positioned in Kenya’s construction industry to collapse from a single legal campaign. But it is, for the first time in its history, genuinely frightened. And in a country where money has too often been the last word on land, that fear is itself a kind of justice.

  • COAST: Rising Insecurity Linked To Mombasa Cement’s Free Food Donations

    COAST: Rising Insecurity Linked To Mombasa Cement’s Free Food Donations

    Mombasa Cement’s free food donation program has come under fierce criticism from city residents who’re now linking it to the rising insecurity in the coastal town.

    The philanthropic program which is funded by Hasu Patel, the proprietor of the cement firm has been a blessing that has morphed into a security catastrophe for the city.

    Mohammed Hersi, the former Kenya Tourism Federation Chairman, renowned hotelier and a resident of Mombasa, has joined his voice to the many in criticized the arguing that it could be playing a big role in the rising insecurity.

    While praising Mombasa cement and philanthropic owner Hasu Patel for having made significant contributions to Mombasa and Kilifi, including fencing schools and beautifying the Kibarani area, the hotelier paused for advising.

    In his criticism, Mr. Hersi stated that the idea of providing free food to the able-bodied is becoming increasingly problematic, as the influx of people from Kilifi and Kwale is overwhelming. Many residents choose to remain on the island, leading to a lack of sleep and a rise in beggers and mob mugging.

    “Drive at night and entire Haile Sellasie road and Moi Avenue including Digi road and even Nkurumah street is full of people ( I refuse to call them street families) sleeping. Why ? They are waiting for the Sunday handout.” He stated.

    “So what happens rest of the days ? Women and Children turn to begging hence the huge number of beggers lately . What about the young people? Well they get creative and start mob mugging which we have seen lately.” He added.

    Food donations not helping

    Mr. Hersi suggests that the culture of free food is not helping these people and should be tied to work and reward. He suggests that the initial help should be relief during calamities, followed by rehabilitation, such as teaching people how to fish. The Kenya coast has rich soil and good weather, and farm inputs and beekeeping can be long-term and rewarding.

    Residents lining up for free food.

    “Initial help is relief and that happens during a calamity like floods , earthquake etc. Once relief has happened you move into Rehabilitation which is teaching a man how to fish . Kenya coast has rich soil and good weather what about farm inputs, bee keeping its long term but rewarding.” He stated.

    He criticizes the culture of free food, stating that it is not helping these people and should not encourage a dependant society. They commend the men who work hard to earn a living and are not waiting for handouts or mugging others.

    “Free things are never treasured, give a man a fish and you feed him for a day but teach the same man how to fish and feed him for life . These people can be helped in better ways , it should be tied to work and reward. They can be given the same food or even payment by say cleaning up Ukunda, Kilifi , Malindi, Likoni et al and the payment happens in those localties to avoid this mess.” He stated.

    Residents cry

    The cries comes after the business community raised concerns over the resurgence of crime gangs that have left them counting millions of losses.

    CCTV footage from one of the streets in Mombasa’s Central Business District (CBD) captured a group of a criminal gang members robbing unsuspected locals earlier this week.

    Robbery caught on camera.

    At least 177 suspected members of a criminal gang have been arrested in Mombasa following a multi-agency operation conducted in the last week arising from the alarming incident.

    Fauz Khalid, former Mvita parliamentary aspirant puts the blame of the criminal gang at the cement’s firm doorstep, “Mombasa Cement’s food bank atrracts many goons.” He stated.

    Nusrat Mohammed, an environmentalist in Mombasa also puts the blame on the company, “This is where blind philanthropy ya Mombasa Cement has reached. It no longer serves the needy, hawa wakora ndio dominating that food distribution place.”

    “Mombasa cement feeds those street boys then wakishiba wanapiga wasee ngeta. He has now promised to bail out those who’ve been arrested.” Another Mombasa resident identifying himself as Bushman stated on X.

    The location of the distribution center appears to be a major issue, “Mombasa Cement needs to move his philanthropic activities away from that. These guys are getting bolder everyday and someone will be badly hurt or killed in the future.” a resident named Vijeba said.

    Macheda Mike highlights the proximity of the food distribution center to the scene of reported crime, “This is like 50-70meters from where Mombasa Cement distributes his relief food daily…most of these boys and streetkids mobilize there. To make it worse, just across the road unaingia Majengo.” He stated.

    Mombasa County under Government Abdulswamad is currently conducting a crackdown to weed out juvenile gangs and to rid the city of preying beggars.

    It won’t be the first time the Mombasa Cement tycoon is running into trouble with the authorities and city residents. He was previously accused of land grabbing and were involved in a circus with the county government over the manner in which he was running his donation scheme.

     

     

  • Mombasa Cement Director Hasmukh Embroiled In Succession Dispute

    Mombasa Cement Director Hasmukh Embroiled In Succession Dispute

    Mombasa Cement Company tycoon Hasmukh Kanji Premji Patel has been dragged into a family succession dispute.

    The dispute involves the estate of his late brother Arvind Kanji Premji Patel and Moza Abdillahi, who bore two kids with Arvind.

    Hasmukh, who was appointed executor of his elder brother Arvind’s will, has been accused by Moza and her two children of being unfair.

    Arvind and Hasmukh were said to be co-directors and shareholders in several companies including Corrugated Sheets Limited, Vishnu Holdings Limited, Standard Rolling Mills Limited, Venus Metals Developers Limited, Vishna Investment Limited and Makomani Investments Limited.
    They were also directors and shareholders at Mombasa Cement and Tororo Cement in Uganda.
    The woman in question and her 20-year-old twins have sued Hasmukh over the share of late Arvind’s multibillion-shilling estate in Kenya and Uganda.

    Moza has accused Hasmukh of forging Arvind’s will, saying by the time of his death in 2013, he was not in the right health and state of mind to sign the documents.

    According to court papers, Arvind was married in 1986 to his wife Bhanuben Devji Bhimji Patel in accordance with Hindu rituals and they had two children- Suraj Arvind and Yashica Arvind.
    However, in 2003, Arvind got into a relationship with Moza, who bore him twins.

    Moza was working under Arvind in one of their many companies; Corrugated Sheets Limited.
    She first joined Corrugated Sheets Limited’s sister company known as Iron International Limited from July 1990 to October 2002.
    Thereafter, she joined Corrugated Sheets from November 2002 until June 2003. It was during this period at Corrugated Sheets that Arvind and Moza got the children together.

    Arvind agreed to support the new family.
    However, Arvind passed on at Mombasa Hospital on May 1, 2013, aged 52 years after an illness.
    Before his death, Arvind had prepared a will and appointed his younger brother Hasmukh as the executor and trustee of his will.

    “Subject to the payment of my just debts, funeral and testamentary expenses and death duties, I direct my executor and trustee to purchase a residential property in Mombasa for Moza Abdillahi Mohamed of up to a value of Sh6,000,000 so that she and our two children can live in that property,” the will read.

    Arvind also directed that Hasmukh pay a sum of Sh150,000 per month to Moza and increase the monthly payment by 10 per cent every year until the two children attain the age of 18 years.
    Hasmukh was also directed to pay Moza and her children a sum of Sh10 million each once the children attain the age of 18 years.

    The executor of the will was also directed to pay all medical expenses for Moza and her children until they attain the age of 18.

    The children turned 18 years in June 2021.
    “I direct that my executor and trustee pay for all educational expenses for the two children from the date of my death and up to degree or diploma level in a local university/ college in Kenya. Moza shall be required to produce invoices and receipts to my executor and trustee for record purposes,” Arvind’s will read.

    According to Hasmukh, his brother signed the will in the presence of Dr Subhashchandra Shah (family doctor), close family members and long-time friends on January 19, 2013, a day before Arvind travelled to India for treatment. The will was prepared at their Nyali Home on Coral Drive.
    On October 10, 2014, a High Court sitting in Mombasa issued and confirmed a grant of probate to Hasmukh to execute Arvind’s will.
    Hasmukh said he presented a copy of the will to Moza on July 6, 2013. However, Moza denied ever seeing a copy of the said Will.

    On February 13 this year, Moza moved to court to challenge the validity of the said will, saying that it was forged and that Arvind was not in the right health and state of mind to sign the documents.
    In a sworn affidavit before the court, she argues that she was not aware of the will until recently when she and her kids sued Hasmukh for refusing to pay Sh3 million for their education abroad.

    Moza further discovered a second will that had been prepared in Uganda, which she said was also not disclosed to them.

    “Upon my advocate obtaining and perusal of the records, it emerged that the deceased (Arvind) had transferred all his shares in Tororo Cement Limited to his first-born son Suraj via another will dated January 19, 2013, which had been lodged at the High Court at Kampala and grant of probate obtained on January 2015,” Moza said.
    The two wills, one in Mombasa and the one in Uganda were prepared by Mona Ketan Doshi, an advocate of the High Court and a partner at Anjarwalla and Khanna LLP firm.

    According to Moza, Arvind and Hasmukh were co-directors and shareholders at Corrugated Sheets Limited, Vishnu Holdings Limited, Mombasa Cement Limited, Kavee Quarries Limited, Standard Rolling Mills Limited, Venus Metals Developers Limited, Sunny Construction Company Limited, Vishna Investment Limited, Makomani Investments Limited and Tororo Cement Limited in Uganda.

    She further argued that Arvind was the chairman of the group of companies before his health started to deteriorate in 2012.

    However, Hasmukh in his sworn affidavits, said his late brother was not a director or shareholder at Corrugated Sheets Limited, Vishnu Holdings Limited, Standard Rolling Mills Limited, Venus Metals Developers Limited, Vishna Investment Limited and Makomani Investments Limited.
    Through his lawyers Samir Inamda and Victoria Okata, Hasmukh argued that the deceased was a director and shareholder at Kavee Quarries Limited (13,834 shares), Mombasa Cement Limited (98,000 shares), Sunny Construction Company Limited (12,000 shares), Venus Metals Developers Limited (400) and Vishna Investment Limited (27,885).

    All of Arvind’s shares were transferred to his first son Suraj Arvind Patel. “It is certainly not true that the deceased was ever chairman of the said group as claimed by Moza who is the first applicant in the suit. At the time of death, my uncle Keshavlal Premji Jetha was still alive and as the eldest member of our family, was the chairman of the said group,” Hasmukh said in his affidavit.

    Hasmukh also argued that Moza and her children have received a sum of Sh60,385,560, that is 44,245,117 for upkeep and maintenance, and Sh16,190,444 for medical and school education from him which he said is over and above the allocation provided for in the will.
    The monies were disbursed to Moza from October 2012 to January 2023.

    He said Moza continued receiving financial support from him since 2013 when his brother died until January 2023 when she received the last instalment of Sh874,847.

    He argued that from May 2013 to June 2021 he disbursed Sh31,990,272 for domestic expenses and Sh18,331,340 was disbursed for school fees and medical expenses.

    Afterwards, he disbursed Sh16,248,418 for domestic expenditures and Sh2,109,104 for school fees and medical expenditures between July 2021 to January 2023.

    According to a report on finance disbursement to Moza, Hasmukh said that the cash disbursements from October 2012 to January 2023 have been charged against monthly maintenance as mentioned in the will and therefore Moza overdrew the account by Sh23,017,443.

    The Sh10 million to each of them upon the children attaining 18 years is still due while the school fees and education expenses of Sh13,321,786 have been written off as her benefits.

    “Hospital bills totalling Sh2,559,608 includes Sh570,984 amount utilised after the children turned 18 which was not provided for in the will,” Hasmukh said.

    The amount designated for procuring a residential property of Sh6 million is yet to be disbursed.

    The two children while appearing before the court faulted their uncle for refusing to pay their university education abroad.

    The two children applied and secured the opportunity to pursue their university education in the UK which required Sh1.5 million each, which their uncle refused to avail.

    During their cross-examination, they argued that their father had intimated to them that he would ensure they attend the best universities of their choice upon completion of their basic education.
    The two were enrolled at Aga Khan Academy Mombasa for years one to six between 2010 and 2016. Later they joined Oshwal Academy where they studied until June 2022 when they completed their A-level education and secured admission to universities in the UK.

    However, their uncle refused to avail funds insisting that the will stated that they be admitted for a diploma or degree course at a Kenyan university.

    “I am prepared nonetheless to pay for the costs of the second and third applicants to be educated in a local university as provided for in the Kenyan will – and nothing more,” Hasmukh said in his defence.

    On Tuesday, Mona Doshi, the lawyer who prepared the will, and two private forensic document examiners Emmanuel Kenga and Dennis Ruto (who both previously worked for the DCI) appeared and testified before the court.

    Doshi was pressed by Moza’s lawyer Richard Ngari to explain the nondisclosure of the two wills for a period of ten years.

    She was also put to task to explain why the original Kenyan will submitted in court was dated, yet the copy presented by the respondent was not dated, and also why the Ugandan will has a reference number yet the Kenyan will did not have a reference number.

    Doshi confirmed to the courts that she and her firm were involved in the preparation of the two wills, but she was not present during the signing, adding that she had instructed their client to sign the documents in the presence of a medical doctor.

    She refuted forgery allegations on the will.
    Moza’s lawyer Ngari also put her to task to explain why the two wills failed to mention the deceased wife Bhanuben Arvind and two children- Suraj Arvind and Yashica Arvind.

    The two forensic examiners concurred that the signatures on the wills were consistent after examining the copies of the documents presented to them on February 21, 2023.

    However, the two differed on the need to have a second opinion to verify findings with one insisting that they are keen in their procedure and thus have no need for re-examination, while the other insisted on the need to have a second opinion so as not to embarrass the DCI.

    The two concurred that the best way to examine a document is to have the original copy.
    The matter is coming up again on July 5.

    External Source.

  • MPs Probe Mombasa Cement Over Land Grabbing Scandal

    MPs Probe Mombasa Cement Over Land Grabbing Scandal

    In one end of the coastal region, Mombasa Cement Company is getting praises thanks to the philanthropy by its owner Hasmukh Patel popularly known as Asu. Most residents of Mombasa have long enjoyed his food program, settling of hospital bills and sorting out their many problems.

    In the neighboring county of Kilifi, the song is a bit different. The cement maker has been accused by locals of grabbing their ancestral land at Vipingo area. Following a lengthened line of accusations and protests, MPs moved in to investigate the matter.

    Residents are accusing the businessman of grabbing a piece of the 803-acre piece of land from them, they’re claiming he’s holding a fake title deed in claiming the ownership of contested plot No 663/IV/MN which they say is rightfully theirs.

    Hasu has been battling for this piece of land for long.

    Local politicians and some residents claim the cement firm used an illegal process to acquire the disputed prime parcels of land at Vipingo area and should therefore be surrendered to the community.

    A parliamentary committee sided with the argument that the land was acquired illegally and recommended the nullification of its titles against a finding by the National Land Commission which gave the process used to acquire the lands from Vipingo Estate Limited in 2005 at a cost of Sh 68 million, a clean bill of health.

    Hasu is said to have been in good books with the then NLC chairman Swazuri giving him an upper hand in acquisition.

    In a bid to stop repossession that has been pushed for by local leaders, Hasu in a case at the High Court in Mombasa, the cement manufacturer through its managing director Hasmukh Patel argues that under the national land commission Act and the constitution, a committee of parliament has no jurisdiction to investigate or overturn a decision on a matter that is the function of a commission.

    The firm also wants the state stopped from implementing the committee’s report that termed the process illegal as NLC had also dispensed with subsequent challenges to the acquisition and transfer after listening to all interested parties, including residents.

    After the committee’s recommendation, the Lands ministry wrote to NLC calling for nullification of the title deeds and handing over the tittles to the county government.

    Earlier this year, a section of Kilifi residents had threatened to sue the firm in a bid to reclaim their land.

    According to the residents, Hasu allegedly grabbed 147 out of 803 acres of land which he later went on to put up a perimeter wall around denying the residents access to the land and development of their property.

    In a demand letter written to the firm dated January 9 2023, Sheria na Haki Human Rights Institute executive director Etore Akaran confirmed that the land belonged to the five residents who acquired it  legally.

    In the same letter Etore said the businessman has no right or legal justification to utilise the land and accused him of trespassing, forceful detention and encroachment, knowing well the land belonged to the aforementioned residents.

    Etore, however, demanded that Mombasa Cement Ltd through Hasu removes the perimeter wall and gives the vacated possession to the aggrieved residents, or else they proceed with the matter to court.

    “Our instructions are hereby to demand, which we hereby do, that you immediately remove that perimeter wall which you constructed on their 147 acres of plots out of 803 acres from the piece of land and you immediately give them a vacate possession to the same,” he added

    In response to Sheria na Haki Human Rights’s letter, Mombasa Cement Ltd lawyer pleaded with the residents to hold for at least 21days as they wait for further instructions from Hasu who was said to be using his lawyers to buy time as he plots his next move

    The lawyer’s letter dated January 13 2023 and signed by Cyprian Onyony failed to admit liability in any form to the demands raised by the residents.

    The organization has also accused him of orchestrating land grabbing problems across Mombasa and Kilifi where he operates his cement manufacturing business.

    Last year, a section of Mombasa residents held demos in the city accusing him of grabbing a public land.

    Still on the Kilifi land, local residents invaded the land in April 2023, machete-wielding youths numbering about 500 invaded the expansive Vipingo Sisal farm along the Mombasa-Malindi Highway claiming ancestral ownership of the land.

    They annexed a section of the farm and put up houses.

    The intruders produced copies of title deeds which they alleged show the land that was leased by Vipingo Sisal Estate belonged to their forefathers.  According to them, the lease had expired.

    Mr Mrima Wanyepe who claimed to be the chairman of the landless in the area said the 800-acre disputed land was supposed to be distributed at the beginning of this year.

    ”Vipingo Sisal Estate lease expired and we applied to have our ancestral land reverted back, we obtained the title deed for 800 acres of the land from the Ministry of Lands which was supposed to divide it for us,” he said.

    A copy of the certificate of title deed shows the document was issued on December 13 last year.

    The county government of Kilifi was supposed to facilitate the adjudication and subdivision of the 800 acres for the squatters but it has been postponing the exercise.

    There have been endless meetings between Centum, Mombasa Cement, locals and the county government to solve the row with the locals standing their ground that the land is theirs. Centum claims ownership of the land through subsidiary Vipingo Development Ltd.

    Some 500,000 people have for years lived as squatters around the Vipingo Sisal plantation. The villagers are also in court seeking an extra 3,900 acres of the sisal plantation.

    MPs intervention.

    It’s in the backdrop of the endless cycle of fights that  MPs have moved in to break the ice.

    The National Assembly Committee on Lands has commenced investigations to resolve disputes over more than 12,000 acres piece of land in Vipingo, Kilifi County, in contention between local community and investors.

    The Committee chaired by North Mugirango Member of Parliament Joash Nyamoko, is set to establish the authenticity of the ideal owners of the piece of land that has been the center of dispute between the locals and Centum Investment Company (who sold it to Mombasa Cement) who both presented their title deeds to claim ownership.

    North Mugirango MP Joash Nyamoko, who is the chairperson of Parliamentary Committee on lands addressing the media at Kilifi County Governor’s residence.

    Kilifi County Governor Gideon Mung’aro supported the move saying that the residents have the right to enjoy the benefits of the land if their tittle deeds will authenticated.

    Munga’ro urged the committee to investigate the Public lands that have reportedly been grabbed illegally by individuals.

    “It is time we know where the lands that were returned to the government disappeared to. Were they returned to the public and if so is there any evidence that they were issued back?” Mungaro said.

    Mung’aro added that the lands whose leases had already expired should also be investigated in order to end conflicts between government and members of the community.

    In the recent past, Mombasa Cement has wedged a war against the Mombasa County accusing them of giving an order to stop them from offering philanthropic services to the residents.

    According to sources privy to the matter, the heightened media campaign is strategic to buy him sympathy as the MPs report on Kilifi land would bring a picture of his side that’s unknown to the public. Will the committee report finally put an end to the matter and make peace with the squatters? Time will tell.

  • Video: Mombasa Cement Implicated In Land Grabbing Scandal

    Video: Mombasa Cement Implicated In Land Grabbing Scandal

    Locals around coastal region led by “Concerned Citizen” human rights activist Bradley Ouna have protested against the alleged land grabbing by Mombasa Cement Company.  

    The group has raised an alarm over the alleged grabbing of a road reserve around Mombasa’s Railway’s roundabout. 

    “We are calling on the county government of Mombasa, the National Land Commission, and the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission to investigate how that section of the road reserve was allocated to Mombasa Cement,” claimed Ouna. 

    Ouna expressed realisation and in support of Mombasa Cement Company’s initiative to feed the poor, however, the group remains adamant and in disagreement on how the situation to award the cement firm the shed which they argue is sitting on a road reserve. 

    The activists have threatened to mobilise the public and bring down the structure in a week’s time, should the cement company not act accordingly. 

    However, Mombasa Cement Company has rejected the allegations claiming that it lawfully purchased the parcel of property. 

    The site was formerly owned by General Tyres, according to Samir Baloo, a Mombasa Cement employee and Tudor Ward MCA staffer. 

    According to the MCA, Mombasa Cement had been using the land for a program to provide free meals to citizens of Mombasa, but the location has remained blocked owing to COVID-19, and the food programs are now being held at Kibarani.