Stella Mutheu, the estranged wife of hotelier William Osewe Guda, took a plea on Wednesday in a case in which her former husband has accused her of ousting him from one of their shared business through forgery.
Ms Mutheu was charged at the Milimani Criminal Courts with the offence of forging minutes and a share transfer document, transferring her 250 shares in Ranalo Foods Dala Limited to herself.
“On August 1,2022 at unknown place within the Republic of Kenya being a director of Ranalo Dala Foods Limited, with intent of to deceive, knowingly made false statement in a document required for registration purpose, namely affidavit of resignation, for William Osewe Guda from Ranalo Foods Dala Limited, submitted to the Director of Business Registration Services purporting that the said William Guda Osewe had resigned as a director of Ranalo Foods Dala Limited, which statement you knew or ought to have known to be false,” reads the charge sheet.
On September 3, 2025, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP) approved the Directorate of Criminal Investigations’ (DCI) request to charge Ms Mutheu with forgery. Mr Osewe first filed the complaint at Central Police Station under OB No. 43/13/09/2024.
Mr Osewe wants Ms Mutheu charged for illegally and unlawfully removing him as a director and shareholder of the Kisumu-based restaurant through forgery, in what is likely to add to the slew of court fights between the once lovebirds.
According to Mr Osewe, it started when he asked his lawyers, Osiemo Wanyonyi Advocates, to search Ranalo Foods Dala Limited. All along, he believed his 25 percent shareholding in the company was intact.
“To his shock, the advocate later informed him that he is no longer a director in the company since, from the documents deposited at the Business Registration Service, it is alleged that the complainant resigned and transferred his 25 percent shares to his ex-wife, Ms Mutheu; that the changes were made by the said complainant’s ex-wife,” said Mr Osewe’s lawyer in a complaint to the DCI dated June 23, 2025.
Documents had been deposited with the registrar showing that he attended a meeting on August 1, 2022, where he agreed to resign and transfer all his 250 shares to his ex-wife.
The city businessman is also alleged to have signed an affidavit before a commissioner for oaths to resign and transfer his shares, leading to his removal from the CR-12, a legal document that shows the ownership of a company at a particular time.
He swears he is not aware of any of this and wants his ex-wife charged with forgery.
Since their separation in 2022, the two have waged a protracted battle for control of the money-minting Ranalo Foods, which trades under the popular brand K’Osewe. Besides the businesses, Ms Mutheu has also laid claim to several of Mr Osewe’s parcels of land, asking the High Court to divide them equally as matrimonial property.
She lost at the High Court, which held that the parcels—most of them in Mr Osewe’s ancestral home of Uyoma, Siaya County—belong to him because she failed to demonstrate any improvements. She has since appealed to the Court of Appeal.
Ms Mutheu—said to have relocated to Kisumu after the separation, where she ran Ranalo Foods Dala—also seeks involvement in managing the Kimathi Street outlet, telling the court that Mr Osewe has blocked her from accessing critical business information. Mr Osewe denies the claims in an affidavit.
