Court enforces family wealth sharing formula

Attempts by a woman to get more of her husband’s property were curtailed after the High Court ruled in favour of her co-wife.

In the matter that involved the two women, Joyce Opisa Amanaka and Christine Nafula Amanaka, the court ordered that the property be shared in the ratio of 9:6 in favour of Ms Opisa, the first wife of Samuel Amanaka.

Sharing formula

High Court Judge William Musyoka ruled that distribution of the estates of a polygamous man must put into consideration the number of children in each wife’s household.

The two women went to court following the death of their husband in October 28, 2015. Amanaka had 11 children, six with the first wife, and five with the second.

Two of his first wife’s children had since died.

The two then sought to be joint administrators of their husband’s estates. The grant was confirmed but the women could not agree on how to share the property.

Ms Nafula wanted the property shared between her and Opisa, without considering the children.

Further, Nafula wanted to inherit the lion’s share of the estates comprising a plot in Kasarani, Nairobi, a stall at Gikomba and cash in Amanaka’s Standard Chartered, Equity, KCB and Cooperative banks.

Additionally, Nafula wanted to inherit 3,200 shares at Kenya Airways, 13,860 shares at Nation Media Group, 2,000 shares at Cooperative Bank and an unknown amount of shares at East African Breweries Limited (EABL).

She proposed that Opisa takes 1,200 shares at Dunlop Kenya Ltd, 700 shares at National Bank, 500 at National Express and 93 at the Standard Chartered Bank.

Opisa, on the other hand, wanted the property shared equally. In her affidavit, she stated that she was the eldest wife of Amanaka, having been married to him in 1968 before Nafula joined the union in 1972.

She said before Amanaka married a second wife, they already had various investments, in which she heavily contributed.

The court heard that attempts by the family to settle the issue amicably had failed.

Citing Section 40 of the Succession Act, Justice Musyoka ruled that the number of surviving children that each wife had would determine the distribution of their husband’s estates.

Section 40

The Section states: “Where an interstate has married more than once under any law permitting polygamy, his personal and household effects and the residue of the net interstate estate shall in the first instance, be divided among the houses according to the number of children in each house, but also according to any wife surviving him as an additional unit to the number of children.”

He noted that Opisa had four surviving children and four grand-children while Nafula had five children.

“The first house has eight children and therefore, adding the widow makes up nine units. The second house has five children, which makes up six units after taking into account the widow,” said Musyoka.

He directed the property shared in the ratio of 9:6 in favour of Opisa. Either parties have 28 days to appeal.