City Billionaire Francis Mburu has taken his case with a Nairobi church a notch higher after accusing it of trying to undercut him over land he reportedly owns.
According to a report by Daily Nation on Sunday, December 15, Mburu successfully managed to stop a planned transfer of the 1.8-acre land in Ruaraka to Gospel Evangelistic Church of Kenya.
In the court papers, the tycoon, through Afrison Export Import Ltd and Huelands Ltd, moved to the Court of Appeal to quash an earlier decision by the Environment and Land Court awarding the land to the church.
The billionaire argued that he had built a strong appeal and that if the church was allowed to develop the land, they would subdivide it and render his appeal useless.
Gospel Evangelistic Church of Kenya had won the case at the lower courts arguing that it had acquired the parcel through adverse possession.
In his papers, Mburu questions whether the church is a legally constituted organisation allowed to acquire land through adverse possession.
In their defence, the owners of the church claimed that they acquired the land in the 1980's and were in the process of developing it before Mburu came along in 1993.
Part of the development was a sanctuary center and a nursery school and they argued that they were gifted the land without any conditions.
The tycoon, however, claimed that he was approached by church officials in October 1985 who wanted one acre for Ksh15 million but failed to adhere to the agreement.
According to an earlier report by Kenyans.co.ke, Mburu made most of his money by receiving a massive payout of Ksh9.8 billion from the government nearly ten years ago.
He also suffered a blow in June 2019 when the high court ruled that the National Land Commission (NLC) misled the Ministry of Education into buying land in Ruaraka including one from the tycoon.
The three-judge bench, Justice Benard Eboso, Elijah Obaga, and Kossy Ber ruled the payment of Ksh1.5 billion to the businessman for the land was irregular.
