For the past 27 years, Solomon Njoroge Kiore has battled with the government over a debt that was initially Sh195 million but has now ballooned to more than Sh500 million in an unpaid bill for presidential furniture he delivered.
Tomorrow (Monday), Mr Kiore will go to the High Court in Milimani hoping that the end is in sight as he is supposed to get a hearing date for a case that has had many twists and turns.
In 1992, Mr Kiore, the proprietor of Furncon, a furniture company, won a government tender to supply presidential furniture but down the line, the deal went sour when the military officials returned the chairs a year after President Daniel arap Moi had used them — allegedly without payment.
The chairs had been acquired through the Ministry of Defence and approved by State House, according to court documents.
The government has denied failing to make the payment and he went to court to seek redress in 2007.
Although Mr Moi used the chairs for a year, Furncon says the military returned them to his workshop.
With the matter dragging through the courts for years, in February 2018, a decision was reached to settle out of court.
But the parties could not agree on the amount to be paid, with the businessman citing lack of goodwill on the side of the state.
Sh527 million
That year, Mr Kiore was seeking Sh527 million, being the price, court costs and storage charges.
He told the court he did not receive any invitation to negotiate a settlement.
Then last year, Symon Yator Cheberek, a military colonel, took over the case after Attorney General Kihara Kariuki appointed him to represent the state in all civil matters in which the Ministry of Defence is a party.
High Court judge Joseph Sergon allowed Col Cheberek to act for the state, but Mr Kiore objected this saying allowing a military officer to take up the matter was tantamount to court-martialling him.
“There can never be a situation where a civilian can be in court one on one with a distinctive disciplined and uniformed force,” he stated in an affidavit on March 25, 2019.
Col Cheberek said he is an advocate of the High Court of Kenya and the Attorney General was in order to appoint him.
Mr Kiore wants Justice Sergon to recuse himself from hearing the matter, alleging bias and citing a 2017 ruling by Justice Philip Mwongo barring the military from taking over the case.
Justice Sergon has declined the recusal plea, saying the claims of bias could not be proved.
Now, Mr Kiore says his business has died, as he can no longer use the premises where he has kept the chair as it is an instrument of power.
“It was used by a President for a year. It is treasured and therefore no one is supposed to touch it. My business has suffered immensely because of this seat,” he says in his court documents.
In a letter dated May 10, 2001, the Attorney General informed Mr Kiore that the Department of Defence had extended a without-prejudice offer purely out of honour and respect for presidential instruments.
“However, having realised that your claims include other items worth millions of shillings reflective of your other financial issues not related to the chair in question, it has not been possible to formally make the offer to you,” states the letter signed by V Onyango, a deputy litigation officer at the State Law Office.
Admission of liability
The offer, the officer states, is not the government’s admission of liability, because “the said chairs were ordered by the Agricultural Society of Kenya”.
The September 1992 deal was not the first. Mr Kiore’s company had sold furniture for VIP use in State functions to the government before.
He says the seat was made under strict supervision of the military and State House staff.
The firm says it was asked to make more furniture for presidential lounges at the Eldoret Moi Airbase and Kahawa Garrison and deliver the chairs to the Agricultural Society of Kenya offices in Nairobi for a three-day presidential function.
But the President ordered that the furniture remain at the ASK offices, according to a letter by the ASK dated August 5, 1999.
Now, Furncon wants a declaration that the ownership of the items was passed on to the government in September 1992, under the National Flag, Emblems and Names Act and as such they are instruments of power.
