Agency seeks seizure of drug trafficking suspect’s buses

The Assets Recovery Agency (ARA) wants six minibuses belonging to a woman charged with trading in narcotic drugs forfeited to the government.

In the petition filed before the anti-corruption court in Milimani, ARA said the six buses which ply the Nairobi-Uthiru route, are proceeds of crime.

ARA said in the application that Ms Rose Musanda, who has denied charges of trafficking in heroin, “devised a complex criminal mechanism of acquiring, trafficking and selling narcotic drugs and registering the properties acquired through her close relatives, associates and hired mules”.

The agency further wants Sh1,788,675, already been frozen and belonging to Ms Musanda, forfeited to the government. Also named in the case are Thomas Odhiambo Konduti and Margaret Wambui Mugo, alleged to be her associates.

Her two accounts containing the Sh1.7 million were frozen in October last year, after she and two other women were charged before a court in Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

The court also directed her to surrender the minibuses and the logbooks to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations.

The agency through Mohamed Adow told the court that there is a thread of evidence showing that she was trading in narcotic drugs and suspicious deposits were made into the accounts and she subsequently acquired the vehicles.

Ms Musanda later filed a petition seeking to unfreeze the accounts and the release of three buses, saying they were wasting away for no reason.

She claimed that the 33-seater matatus were acquired from loans at Sidian and Equity banks and had no connection with alleged illegal trade in narcotic drugs.