Nyayo House in Nairobi where the Department of Immigration offices are based. PHOTO | FILE
What you need to know:
Jean Eleanor Margaritis Otto says immigration officers arrested and detained her on July 3, and threatened to deport her if she did not bribe them to validate her stay in Kenya.
The American adds that she was apprehended despite furnishing the officers with her passport and six-month business visa.
An American woman working for USAID has sued Attorney-General Githu Muigai and Interior secretary Joseph Nkaissery in a bid to stop her prosecution and possible deportation.
Jean Eleanor Margaritis Otto has filed a suit in the High Court, seeking to quash the criminal case against her, arguing it could lead to her unlawful deportation.
The aid agency worker says immigration officers arrested and detained her on July 3, and threatened to deport her if she did not bribe them to validate her stay in Kenya.
Ms Otto adds that she was apprehended despite furnishing the officers with her passport and six-month business visa.
She insists that her visa is valid but immigration police hold that a handwritten “1m” in her passport means she was only granted a month’s stay in Kenya.
After her arrest, she was taken to the immigration headquarters at Nyayo House where her travel documents were confiscated. The officers allegedly rushed her arraignment after she declined to buy her freedom.
Prof Muigai, Mr Nkaissery, the Milimani Chief Magistrate’s Court and the Director of Immigration Services have all been enjoined as respondents in the suit but are yet to respond.
“The lady immigration officer proceeded to show Ms Otto a handwritten “1m” above her entry stamp, stating this illegible handwriting invalidated her visa and limited her stay in Kenya to one month.
“She was then threatened with imprisonment and deportation which could be avoided and at some point insinuated that ‘if Ms Otto co-operated’ her stay in Kenya can be sanitised,” her lawyer Allan Onyango said.
Ms Otto is a technical advisor for Afyainfo, a USAID-funded programme in Kenya. The project is aimed at establishing a national health information system that generates quality data used at all levels to improve health service delivery.
USAid launched the programme in 2011 and is expected to complete it next year. The suit will be heard today by the judge on duty in the Judicial Review division of the High Court.
Ms Otto wants proceedings in the criminal case stopped until her application to quash them entirely is heard and determined.
Her lawyer argues that any document or decision contradicting the issuance of her six-month visa before cancelling it is irregular and illegal hence cannot be the basis of a criminal charge.
The criminal trial against her is expected to begin on Wednesday. Ms Otto has faulted the manner in which she was treated.
She claims to have even taken the arresting officers to her Upper Hill office and furnished them with a copy of her US driver’s licence. She also gave them her home address details.
She has also faulted the authorities for not telling her what she was being charged with until she met “the big boss” at Nyayo House.
Ms Otto avers that she had never noticed the handwritten “1m” which police said nullified her six-month visa. After she pleaded not guilty to the charges before a magistrate in the Milimani Law Courts, her passport was detained as authorities told the court that she is a flight risk.
She adds that the officers told her that all she needed to do to secure her release and get valid documents was to “motivate the sanitisation process”.
“The Attorney-General, Interior minister and Director of Immigration Services have no powers to arrest, detain or arraign Mr Otto in court in such an arbitrary manner on trumped up criminal charges for her failure to comply with their officers’ unlawful demands,” Mr Onyango said.
Mr Onyango says the US national has never had a brush with the law and has been law abiding since she started visiting Kenya, and that her legitimate expectations of fair treatment have been violated.
Ms Otto was to stay in Kenya until mid-October when her visa expires. She now maintains that she still has an option to apply for an extension of her stay as she is yet to exceed the visa’s limit.
Her arrest, she states, reeks of discrimination, and breaches laws on national security that provide that they shall only be implemented with utmost respect to human rights.
“The rascal actions of the Immigration Director, Interior CS and Chief Magistrate’s court if not checked by this court will continue to cause Ms Otto serious infringement of her constitutional rights.
If the said trial is allowed to commence to conclusion she is not likely to get justice at all,” Mr Onyango argues.
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