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Mitchell Cotts MD risks jail in land row
Staff at Mitchell Cotts opening a container. The freight service company is locked in a dispute with a businessman over a piece of land in Nairobi. PHOTO | FILE | NATION MEDIA GROUP
A brother of Kiambu governor William Kabogo wants two senior managers of Mitchell Cotts, a freight service provider, committed to civil jail for denying his firm access to a piece of land along Mombasa Road despite a court order to the same effect.
Evan Kamau has filed an application in the High Court seeking to have Mitchell Cotts managing director Daniel Tanui and group commercial manager Geoffrey Matianyi jailed for allegedly refusing to comply with a court order barring them from evicting his firm, Forest Gump, from the land.
Several warehouses stand on the disputed property and Forest Gump insists that it was allowed to continue using godown 4 on the property.
Mr Kamau says the High Court issued an order stopping Mitchell Cotts from evicting Forest Gump from the disputed piece of land, and granting his firm unrestricted access to the land in dispute. Mitchell Cotts, he adds, has ignored the order despite serving it to the freighter .
“The order given on October 14, 2013 was extracted on September 1 this year and served on Mitchell Cotts the following day. The firm, through its managing director and group commercial manager, has refused to comply with the same despite proper service,” said Mr Kamau.
The freighter has however denied being served with the court order, and wants Forest Gump’s application to be struck out. Mr Matianyi insists that the order also relates to a different piece of land also in dispute. He added that the orders expired in October last year.
“The order issued in September 2013 relates to the land on L.R. number 19141 and not godown number 4. It was to subsist until October 3, 2013 and at no time did Forest Gump complain to the court that the order was disobeyed,” said Mr Matianyi in court papers.
Forest Gump, however, contends that the court file had been misplaced, hence it could not extract the orders granted. It insists that the two Mitchell Cotts bosses should be sent to civil jail for failing to comply with the order.
“It is illegal and a contempt of court for Mitchell Cotts’ officials to insist on disregarding the order. We believe that its officials should be taken action against for the contemptuous manner in which they continue dealing with the court’s authority and dignity,” Mr Kamau added.
The 10-month delay is the subject of another application filed by Mitchell Cotts two weeks ago, seeking to strike out the order. Mitchel Cotts argues that the lease Forest Gump had been granted expired on September 15, and that it only extracted the court order after being informed of the expiry.
Both parties agreed to have Forest Gump’s application determined together with another application filed by Mitchel Cotts seeking to lift the order stopping it from interfering with the disputed land. Lady Justice Nyamweya will mention the matter on December 5 to give the parties a ruling date.
