Ex-City town clerk seeks compensation for detention
The Nairobi City’s first town clerk has moved to court seeking over Sh 280million as compensation for wrongful ten months detention during President Jomo Kenyatta’ regime.
Mr Lewis Wilkinson Kimani Waiyaki, 87, claimed that he was abducted from a rented cottage at Rubaga in Kampala, Uganda on March 1968 by the Special branch Kenya police.
The former Kenya People’s Party Union (KPU) member claimed that the officers teamed up with about 20 others from the Uganda Research Bureau to kidnap him after raiding his place of residence, ransacking it and took him to secret locations including forests while subjecting him to torture.
The retired London qualified lawyer, claimed that he was shuffled between various locations under very inhumane conditions, often at the back of a truck while being handcuffed, naked, soaked in rain, deprived of food and water as well as locked up in solitary confinement.
In his suit against the Attorney General, Mr Waiyaki blamed the then AG Charles Njonjo for being behind the abduction.
While testifying before High Court judge Isaac Lenaola he said that Mzee Kenyatta invited him to state house after he was released on December 19, 1968 and when Mr Njonjo was asked to explain the reason for his detention, he had no documents to justify.
“Government functionaries then considered me as a traitor because of the rivalry between the Jaramogi Oginga Odinga’s KPU and Mzee Kenyatta’s KANU. From the time I joined KPU in1966, Mr Njonjo threatened to finish me for being traitor,” he said.
TRAUMATIZED
Mr Waiyaki, who now resides in Kiambu county, alleged that his family became traumatized, his bar and restaurant business in Kampala that was worth Sh 300,000 was ruined and a Sh 200,000 Hillman Minx KAX 125 vehicle was vandalized.
The father of nine also alleged that his clothes, shoes and furniture worth about Sh 100,000 were stolen among other things and that he suffered a total loss of Sh 750,000.
He further claimed that upon his release, he was unable to secure gainful employment because his detention had been gazetted and that the political environment could not allow him to take the matter to court earlier.
He wants it declared that the mistreatment and mishandling during detention violated his rights against torture.
He is seeking a further declaration that his detention was based on a political affiliation hence his freedom of expression, association and political rights were infringed besides Sh 280, 200, 000 as compensation.
He also wants it declared that the unwarranted searches at his houses and the destruction of his assets stifled his economic development besides denying him the right to privacy and protection of property.
But Justice Lenaola directed that the case be mentioned on October 21 and that an expert be availed to quantify the alleged losses terming the matter as serious.