Economy
Kirima family seeks renewal of leases for 20 city properties
Thursday April 17 2014The High Court has ordered administrators of the disputed Gerishon Kirima estate to pay land rent and tax arrears for which one of his sons is being held liable.
Justice Isaac Lenaola ordered Anne Kirima and her step mother, Teresia Wairimu, to pay the Kenya Revenue Authority Sh7 million in taxes accrued between 2008 and 2011.
Wanjau Kirima, the son, said the co-administrators of the properties were taking long to pay the land rents and that KRA had charged him over the arrears and put his name on a tax defaulters’ list.
He had urged the court to restrain KRA from attaching his bank account over the unpaid arrears and was granted the wish.
The orders came as the family sought the intervention of the High Court to have leases of at least 20 properties in Nairobi renewed in order to secure them from “those purporting to be managing them.”
The request came as Justice Isaac Lenaola ordered the family to make an inventory of the assets and liabilities of the estate, which are believed to be worth billions of shillings, in order to facilitate direction on how the wealth would be shared.
“I want both parties to make a report of the properties that they know of or think their late father owned all over Kenya so that as the distribution of this properties starts, we know what the whole estate is comprised of and enable equity in its distribution between the parties,” Justice Lenaola said.
Last year, the judge brokered a truce between the late Kirima’s children and their stepmother after they engaged in dramatic feuds over the control of the estate.
On Thursday, Justice Lenaola directed the children and their stepmother to give submissions and certified documents of the estate properties within 14 days. The case will be mentioned on May 16.
Justice Lenaola said he could not allocate any property to any member of the late tycoon’s family unless the assets and liabilities of the estate were established.
Anne Kirima asked the court to grant orders to extend leases of 20 properties lying within Nairobi. She said the county government should renew the leases in the name of their late father to forestall third parties and the competing beneficiaries from appropriating them.
Justice Lenaola said reports on the properties would be scrutinised by the parties to avert disagreements.
On October 30 2013 the parties reached a deal sharing the multi-billion-shilling estate, ending a three- year battle that had played out in Nairobi and London.
READ: Lessons Kirima estate row offers business owners
Kirima’s children led by Anne and his wife, Teresia, signed a consent to share out the property with the two being co-administrators.
The properties to be shared out included a parcel of land in Njiru that is claimed by squatters and another in Kariobangi, which would be distributed equally to 15 beneficiaries.
A 20-acre property in Kisaju, Kajiado County, was also to be distributed while another 14 acres would be shared out once a dispute with squatters was resolved.
The list of properties that had expired leases was to be compiled and the titles extended with the estate paying the cost. The children were also given a grant of Sh2 million each and awarded a Christmas bonus of Sh500,000 each for last year.
Justice Lenaola had earlier in June invalidated two wills apparently signed by the businessman and presented by the rival parties.
He said the estate had huge debts owed to the Kenya Revenue Authority while the land in Njiru measuring 500 acres, the subject of several lawsuits, had been invaded by squatters organised as the Naridai Muoroto Self Help Group Kirima, a former Starehe MP, died at a South African hospital in 2010 aged 88.