By Enock Mukoma
Kenya National Highways Authority(KeNHA) will appeal against a windscreen claim by a top city lawyer. The road agency was slapped with a Sh. 756000 claim by a Kajiado court, following a claim by Ahmed Nassir Abdullahi(The Grand Mullah). Nassir claimed his Bentley windscreen was destroyed by flying stones on Namanga Road.
He claimed in court papers that the accident occurred on his way from Arusha, Tanzania. A synopsis into the ruling, Iays bare possible arm twisting tactics. For a start, the road in question has a speed limit of 110 kilometres per hour, Meaning the Grand Mullar must have either been speeding on not observing the required distance to the next vehicle. In the lengthy ruling, the magistrate notes that the grand mulla did not report the accident to the police as is required by the Kenya’s traffic act.
The lawyer did not produce his stamped passport to prove that he traveled to Tanzania on the said dates and neither did the schedule by the referenced travel company show his names or even the name of his daughters in its manifest. Nassir produced a receipt of repairs of his windscreen without any referral either by insurance or court approved repair agent.
The Magistrate may therefore have made his ruling based on intimidation by the Grand Mullah and not on evidence adduced before it. The threshold of evidence in such a case would be too low going forward. The higher courts will be persuaded to dismiss the claim. It will be hard to sustain in the an appeal court.
