The long-stalled Sh320 million fake government tender case against Nairobi politician Francis Mureithi is finally set to move forward after a magistrate threw out an attempt to push him off the matter.
Magistrate Robinson Ondiek on Friday dismissed an application seeking his recusal, saying the complainant had failed to demonstrate any bias or conflict of interest. The decision effectively ends yet another delay in a case that has sat in the corridors of justice since 2016 without a single substantive hearing.
The dispute pits Mureithi and his co-accused, Francis Mwaura, against retired United Nations diplomat Haile Menkerios, who alleges the two fleeced him out of Sh320 million in a fake Ministry of Defence tender scheme.
According to the charge sheet, Mureithi and Mwaura allegedly convinced Menkerios that their company, Doc Find Limited, held lucrative food supply contracts with the Defence ministry. Investigators say the pair backed up the claims with forged local purchase orders, doctored agreements and a fictitious sugar supply deal purportedly tied to Mumias Sugar Company.
The alleged scam played out between April and November 2016 in the final months of Menkerios’s diplomatic career in Ethiopia. Despite the scale of the accusations, the criminal charges were only filed in November 2020. Mureithi pleaded not guilty and secured release on Sh5 million cash bail or Sh10 million bond.
Detectives from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations traced about Sh75 million of the money to the purchase of shares at CISCOS Kenya Limited and the acquisition of property in the high-end Karen neighbourhood. The prosecution lined up seven counts against Mureithi, among them obtaining money by false pretenses, forgery and uttering forged documents.
At the same time, Menkerios pursued a civil case seeking to claw back more than Sh630 million. But the High Court shut that avenue last year, with Justice Freda Mugambi ruling that the complainant had not produced bank records or contracts to prove how the money allegedly changed hands or the nature of the business engagement with Mureithi.
Mureithi’s lawyers have consistently insisted the entire saga is a commercial dispute dressed up as a criminal case. Led by advocate Dancun Okach, the defence argues that no concrete evidence links their client to fraudulent activity and that Menkerios entered a murky investment arrangement without proper paperwork.
The case has drawn public interest not only because of the staggering figures involved but also due to Mureithi’s political profile. The former Embakasi East aspirant campaigned on a Jubilee ticket in 2017 before shifting allegiance to President William Ruto’s Kenya Kwanza coalition ahead of the 2022 polls.
With the failed attempt to dislodge Magistrate Ondiek, the matter now heads back to court for hearing dates. Legal analysts say the ruling marks the clearest signal yet that the judiciary intends to untangle a case that has drifted for nearly a decade, leaving both the complainant and the accused trapped in procedural quicksand.
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