Ferdinand Waititu challenges court orders

                                                           Ferdinand Waititu                PHOTO; COURTESY

By WILFRED AYAGA

Embakasi MP Ferdinand Waititu has challenged a restraining orders issued against his appointment as the chairman of the Athi Water Services Board.

Waititu has pleaded with the court to allow him to clear his name over the alleged questionable land transactions and other claims that were raised in the suit filed by businessman Benson Ritho.

In his papers seeking to be enjoined in the case, Waititu says the court orders given by Justice Mumbi Ngugi on Thursday last week, blocking his appointment, were made without full disclosure of all material facts relating to the matters raised by the businessman.

He is accusing Ritho of misleading the court and failing to establish the accuracy and truthfulness of the integrity claims against him before challenging his appointment.

On Monday, the businessman obtained the court orders on grounds that Waititu had pending integrity issues. Among them was that he was involved in suspect land transactions in Embakasi, Nairobi. At the centre of the claims is a piece of land which the businessman says came to Waititu’s possession illegally.

He is also accusing Waititu of threatening members of the Maasai community with eviction from Embakasi last year.

Waititu, however, says the statements in Ritho’s suit were designed to hoodwink the court into reaching a decision against him.

 “The petitioner does not disclose that there is in fact no one who died in the altercations attributed to the applicant in regard to the Maasai community,” he says.