By JULIUS SIGEI jsigei@ke.nationmedia.com
Posted Friday, February 17 2012 at 22:30
Posted Friday, February 17 2012 at 22:30
Retired President Moi’s son, Philip, who was on Thursday committed to jail for failing to pay maintenance fee to his estranged wife Rossana Pluda and their two children is not new to controversy.
His brushes with the law go as far back as the early 1990s.
A Parliamentary Accounts Committee report tabled in Parliament by then Chairman Henry Obwacha accused Mr Moi of importing a car under the guise of diplomatic privilege and later changing the number plate after avoiding duty and VAT.
According to The Hansard of October 1999, Mr Moi wrote to the Registrar of Motor Vehicles requesting change of number plate citing security issues.
“I kindly request you to change the registration of my vehicle because I have become a target of thieves. It is now the third time they have tried to steal my car,” The Hansard quotes Mr Moi‘s letter.
The registration number of the vehicle — chassis number EDA 1400322 A172571 — was later changed to KAA 971S and later KAD 738Q.
The committee recommended that the Commissioner of Customs should recover the money.
Mr Moi, a retired army major, would again get into problems in 2000 after a company associated with him, Cut Tobacco, which manufactured Horseman cigarettes, was accused of using counterfeit stamps to evade tax.
After a hide-and-seek game with the police, the company was closed but later reopened after the company took KRA to court citing contempt.
But his biggest nightmare, so far, is the jail threat now hanging around his neck.
Mr Moi’s woes began when his wife went to court and obtained orders in May 2010 to have him pay her an outstanding debt of Sh2.7 million and monthly upkeep of Sh250,000 for their children.
An aggrieved Philip sought temporary orders to stop Rosanna from demanding the money.
Philip said he was struggling to survive with help from his friends and sister.
Saying he drew no riches from his family name and does not draw any support from his father, Mr Moi said the only income he had was a paltry pension he gets as a retired army officer.
“I don’t own the property listed by Rossana as mine and a search at the registry can confirm this. I don’t operate foreign bank accounts or own a new car,” he claimed.
But in his ruling, High Court Judge G.B.M. Kariuki said Mr Moi was not poor. “He is not a man of straw,” he said.
The court also said he did not provide the court with any evidence regarding the extent of his wealth and financial ability.
The court said Philip had “withheld valuable information” which would have helped it reach its decision.
Rossana went to court to ask it to compel Philip to show cause why he should not be committed to civil jail and why his property should not be attached for failing to pay what he owes.
She said Philip was a man of means and provided the court with a list of properties she believes belongs to her husband.
Among the properties listed by Rossana is a palatial home in Muthaiga, a house with a swimming pool in Nakuru standing on 350 acres of land, a building in Riverside, Nairobi, and a beach house on an eight-acre piece of land at Watamu.
As their tussle escalated, his wife recorded a statement last September at the Criminal Investigation Department headquarters on Kiambu Road saying she had received threatening phone calls and messages from him.
Mr Moi recorded a statement in the same office denying the allegations.
“You could not know he was the son of a president by just looking at him,” said a senior journalist who was his classmate at Kagumo High School, Nyeri County, in the late 1970s.Those who know Philip say he is the most accessible and easygoing of Moi’s scions.
“A very social man, he once loaded three of his best friend’s boxes in the Mercedes that came to pick him from school just after his father became president in 1978 saying he could not see the logic of his friends struggling with the loads as he was driven alone in a huge car,” said the journalist.
The older Moi, a disciplinarian, conscripted his son into the army from where he soon began the luxury car import business.
He is said to have had one leg in the army and the other in the business world.
He is described by people close to the former first family as his mum’s boy.
He was close to her during the time the elder Moi was estranged with his late wife, Lena.
“But Mzee loves him and is really hurting for him as he undergoes all these problems. It is only he who is not reciprocating,” said the source.
He cited one incident when the former president learnt that Philip was ill and wanted to visit him.
“He switched off his phone and left for Mombasa,” said the source.
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