The Court of Appeal on Friday, November 8, found that the process used by private developers to acquire over 100 residential houses in Woodley/Joseph Kang’ethe Estate, Nairobi County, was fraudulent, illegal, null and void.
This estate, comprising prime residential houses on approximately one acre each, has an estimated market value of Ksh1 billion.
Justices Francis Tuiyott, Jessie Lesiit and Grace Ngenye-Macharia unanimously made the decision while upholding the judgement of Justice Okong’o of the Environment and Land Court in the lead file (ELC Case No. 2054 of 2007) in multiple recovery suits filed by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) against private developers who allegedly grabbed residential properties at Woodley Estate belonging to Nairobi City County Government.
The appeal was initiated by Paul Moses Ng’ethe in response to the decision in the lead file before the Environment and Land Court.
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Meanwhile, 52 other recovery suits involving multiple properties have been pending before the lower court, awaiting the Court of Appeal’s decision, which now found that the process used to acquire the properties was flawed and legally untenable.
The initial recovery suits were first filed in the High Court on October 2006 by the defunct Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission (KACC), predecessor of the current EACC, and subsequently transferred to the Environment and Land Court.
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In its judgement in the lead file, the Environment and Land Court ruled in favour of EACC and issued orders declaring the title held by Moses Ng’ethe invalid, null, and void for all intents and purposes for having been acquired fraudulently and illegally.
Court orders appellant to pay EACC costs of appeal
Justice Okong’o further issued orders directing the Registrar of Lands to cancel and erase from the Nairobi Land Registry all the illegal entries relating to the property and a permanent injunction restraining Ng’ethe, whether by himself, his servants or agents, from dealing with the grabbed property otherwise than by way of surrender to the government.
Paul was dissatisfied with the Land Court’s decision and later filed an appeal before the Appellate Court, which on Friday November 8 dismissed his appeal for lack of merit and confirmed the entire judgement of the Environment and Land Court.
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As such, Kang’ethe was ordered by the Court of Appeal to pay the costs of the appeal to EACC.
As a result, EACC will proceed to execute the ELC Judgement, including requiring the appellant, his agents, tenants or any other persons currently occupying the recovered property to deliver vacant possession for handover to the Government.
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