There was drama at St. James Anglican Church of Kenya located in Nairobi's Buruburu Estate after a widow and her children caused commotion demanding the arrest of one of the church leaders who had allegedly used their title deed to secure a hefty loan.
According to the family of Margaret Waititi Ndung'u, the church leader accused of grabbing land reportedly duped them into handing over their title deed to secure loans after deceiving them with false promises to help them clear off their initial loan.
Videos seen by Kenyans.co.ke showed the 75-year-old lady screaming at the top of her lungs while lifting her dress in protest of the church leader's ungodly act. She was outside the church.
Her children also joined in the screaming insisting that the man of the cloak had subjected them to untold suffering with his fake promises.
She further stated that the church leader was in the final stages of stealing her piece of land located on the outskirts of Nairobi's metropolitan area of Ngong'.
The struggle over the piece of land dates back to 2013 when the widow took a loan of Ksh600,000 using her land title. However, when she failed to pay back the loan, the church leader offered to pay off the debt in exchange for her title deed.
The title was to be used as collateral in the promise that Waititi would repay the man of the cloak later, with her grandson Kelvin Mburu revealing that the money was borrowed from a savings society.
''She had a loan of Ksh670,000 from one of the credit savings societies. She was then brought a person who was to pay for her so that the land would not be taken away,'' Mburu stated.
However, the matriarch was shocked years later when she learnt that the land that had been earmarked for the Standard Gauge Railway project was not in her name. This was when she was following up on the compensation claims.
The government informed her that she could not be compensated as the land was registered in the name of the church leader who had since transferred the details to his earthly possessions.
''The SGR people told us that our grandmother's land had been hived into and so there was a dispute. That is when the church leader came and said that the land was his,'' he added.
The church leader is also reported to have used the same title deed to secure a loan of Ksh6 million meaning she (the widow) could not receive compensation from the government until the loan was fully paid.
A court in Kajiado, however, ruled in May 2023, that the land should be returned to the widow as the legal landowner, following protracted court battles.
The church leader who was finally rounded up by the police and transferred to Kajiado Police Station after being held briefly at Bururuburu police station, is said to have employed deceptive means to ignore the court order.
