The High Court in Nairobi has ordered a former Kilifi Principal Land Registrar and his associates to forfeit assets worth about 426.8 million shillings to the government after finding they could not adequately explain how the wealth was acquired.
Justice Benjamin Musyoki delivered the judgment on 18 September 2026 in a case brought by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission under Section 55 of the Anti-Corruption and Economic Crimes Act.
The order covers Felix Mecha Nyakundi, his wife Stellah Nyaboke Otwori, and companies linked to the family, including The Bantu Hotel and Resort Company Limited.Investigations by the commission looked at the period from January 2013 to March 2024.
During that time Nyakundi’s gross monthly salary rose from about 69,660 shillings to 115,630 shillings.
The commission established that the group had acquired assets valued at roughly 771.9 million shillings. These included more than 467 million shillings that moved through various bank and M-Pesa accounts, properties worth about 287 million shillings, motor vehicles valued at around 20 million shillings, and 4.26 million shillings in cash recovered during a search.
The court found that only about 58 million shillings of those assets could be satisfactorily explained by known legitimate income. As a result it declared the balance unexplained and ordered its forfeiture. The sum to be surrendered includes roughly 233.6 million shillings held in bank and mobile-money accounts, properties valued at 177.1 million shillings, three motor vehicles worth nearly 11.9 million shillings, and the cash seized earlier.
Among the properties are the Bantu Hotel along Kangundo Road in Nairobi, valued at 107.7 million shillings, an apartment block in Utawala worth 35 million shillings, a penthouse in Mombasa valued at 19 million shillings, and several parcels of land in Kilifi and Thika.
The vehicles ordered forfeited are registered in Otwori’s name.
The commission noted that while Nyakundi served at the Kilifi Land Registry his wife received multiple allocations of land in settlement schemes, including parcels that exceeded the usual limit of one plot per household.
The court did not require proof of a specific criminal offence. It held that the disproportion between the assets and the known income was sufficient to justify the recovery order.
Banks and mobile-money providers have been directed to transfer the remaining balances in the listed accounts to the government through the commission.
Land registrars are to facilitate the transfer of the identified properties.
The decision forms part of ongoing efforts by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission to recover assets that public officials and those close to them cannot account for from legitimate sources.
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