• Hotel's 49 former staff died in poverty after being kicked off unceremoniously
• Parliamentary Labour committee vows to have them compensated
Image: FILE
Parliament has raised the hopes of 707 former employees of the once prestigious African Safari Club who have been waiting for their dues since the owner died six years ago.
The National Assembly Labour and Social Services Committee visited the workers on Tuesday and vowed to ensure they are compensated.
The hotel group's 49 former employees have died in penury, their dignity soiled by the fact that they could not afford a meal a day.
The former servants are demanding Sh295 million from the hotel group, whose founder Karl Jacob Ruedin, died at his Shanzu home in Kisauni constituency in 2013.
Humphrey Lowo, a multilingual tour guide who had grasped the German, French, Italian and English languages courtesy of his work from 1979, said the money he had saved with the hotel group's two cooperatives vanished after one of the hotel directors "escaped" with it to Germany.
“Our children had to drop out of school and our wives left us because we could no longer provide for them, ” chairman of the former employees Benjamin Wa Nzimbi said.
But the visit by MPs at Majaoni in Kisauni gave a glimmer of hope to the servants whose attempts to seek help from the Labour offices have been futile.
“Our previous attempts to seek help from our political leaders through the previous Kisauni MPs all bore no fruit. Our rewards were empty promises,” Nzimbi said.
They never attempted to seek redress from the Labour Relations Court because they could not afford the legal fees.
Then came Kisauni MP Ali Mbogo, who took their petition to Parliament resulting in the visit by 11 members of the Labour committee.
“We don’t want the image of Parliament to be soiled. We want to see action from the committee,” Mbogo said.
Committee chairman Bura MP Ali Wario said they will not stop until justice is served for the 707 former staff.
“The committee will summon the receiver manager of the group to give us all the records of the property in possession of the group,” Wario said.
Those affected include Ahmed Mwinyihaji, the resort manager of the Flamingo Resort, one of the hotels under the African Safari Club group.
He said he was sacked moments after informing his colleagues he was going to the mosque for Friday noon prayers.
“Shortly after, I was called and told people have been locked out of the hotel. I went to inquire what was happening and was told we had been fired,” Mwinyihaji said.
One of the former employees broke down as she narrated how she could not afford a decent shelter and food for her children after they were unceremoniously laid off.
The founder of the group Ruedin, a Swiss national born in 1939, started tour and hotel operations in Kenya in 1967 with the construction of his first hotel, the Watamu Beach Hotel in Watamu, North Coast.
For more than 40 years, he enjoyed direct access to the highest levels of the Kenya political establishment, who in turn favoured him with regular profits, substantial shareholding and prime beach property.
Committee vice chairperson Bomet Woman Representative Joyce Korir said all the property of the fallen tycoon will be investigated and possibly sold to pay the former workers.
“We are not here to make our names. We don’t do PR. We work for the people. We will walk with you until a solution is found,” Korir said.
Trans Nzoia Woman Representative Janet Nangabo said Kenya must not allow tycoons to come into the country and oppress Kenyan workers.
“We must go to the Labour offices and ensure there are measures in place to protect Kenyan workers from such oppression,” Nangabo said.
Others who visited the former servants include MPs Ronald Tonui (Bomet Central), James K’Oyoo (Muhoroni), Gladys Wanga (Homa Bay), Catherine Wambilianga (Bungoma) and Safia Sheikh Adan (Marsabit).
(Edited by R.Wamochie)