Ketan Somaia, whom a UK court convicted of obtaining money by deception, needs no introduction in Kenya. Somaia cut controversial deals and at one point he was a guest of the State at Kamiti Maximum Security Prison.
That was in 2005 when Somaia and his arch-business rival Kamlesh Pattni saw their pursuit of riches crumble in ignominy as they ended up in Kamiti. Earlier in August 2003, Somaia had been arrested at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport as he prepared to fly out of the country.
He had just returned to Nairobi from London before he was arrested and grilled and later released.
Somaia, a Kenyan of Asian origin, ran away to London in the mid 1990s after being implicated in a $5 million (Sh439 million) scandal in which he was to supply the Kenya Police with communications equipment that he allegedly failed to deliver.
Believed to enjoy cordial relations with top officials of the previous Kanu administration, Somaia snubbed all summons to appear before the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee to answer charges over the equipment deal. When the National Rainbow Coalition (Narc) government was elected in 2002, Somaia was reported to have started making overtures to top officials with a view to being let off the hook. Pressure mounted for his arrest until police summoned him.
The concern led to Tanzanian authorities formally requesting that the businessman be handed over to them for questioning over monies allegedly owed to the collapsed Delphis Bank where he was a key shareholder.
Another complaint facing Somaia in Dar es Salaam was from businessman Vincent Laswai, who claimed the accused swindled him out of $248,000(Sh21 million) in 2000.
His surprise arrest in Kenya then followed a request for his extradition from Tanzania where he had been accused of defrauding a businessman of £150,000 (Sh22 million). Tanzania had just closed the local Delphis bank.
Instead of being extradited, Somaia was charged with stealing almost £1 million (Sh149 million) (from the National Bank of Kenya (NBK) in a deal to import London taxis.
Then, Somaia was charged with defrauding a German-based businessman of £2.2 million (Sh328 million). He was given bail.
The Banking Fraud Unit in April 2003 charged the controversial tycoon with defrauding the NBK of Sh112 million shillings (then $6 million) between 1988 and 1989.
He purportedly obtained letters in the name of former President Moi to win the contract but the park board later dismissed the letters as forgeries. Authorities in Tanzania, Uganda and Mauritius, had also made extradition requests for Somaia or started investigations into him in 2003. Hertfordshire Fraud Squad began an investigation last year after it was claimed Somaia failed to return an investment of £500,000 (Sh74 million) in Delphis Bank of Mauritius, which he formerly headed.
business partners
Somaia was finally allowed to leave Kenya for India in December 2005 on medical grounds where he was arrested again. He was arrested in connection with alleged theft of Sh45.8 million in 2002 belonging to Hemini Plc.
He and millionaire-preacher Pattni became business partners when the latter bought shares in the former’s Marshalls East Africa Ltd.
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Other concerns in which Somaia had direct interests included Block Hotels, United Touring Company, Casinos, and Baumanns.
It was these companies that Pattni’s lawyers said on March 22, 2006, he bought shares but Somaia declined to relinquish the stakes.
Still in June the same year, Somaia was in trouble again. There was a fraud case in the UK and he was at the centre of it, accused of swindling a family of some Sh66 million. He never returned to Kenya.
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