A rich 80-year-old Eldoret farmer, a dodgy 'will', two wives, 15 children, alleged adultery and forgery, the fragile patriarch's suspicious thumprint on Sh1 billion land transfer papers and a blind lawyer who attested to it.
Oh, and the 'will' was kept secret for years by Family Number Two.
Sound convoluted and suspicious?
That's what Eldoret Hgh Court judge Hellen Omondi said in her ruling yesterday.
She threw out the will left by Gideon Sawe Kipkessio, saying it raised suspicions and doubts as to how it was drafted before his death.
Omondi herself ordered the land division, mostly in Eldoret: About 12.5 acres to each son, about six acres to each married daughter.
She said the will appeared skewed in terms of how Sawe distributed his wealth in a way that disadvantaged his first wife and her five children.
It favoured his second wife and her 10 children.
Judge Omondi also questioned why the second family kept the will secret. It was not disclosed until much later when it was presented to a district officer.
“This doubt as to the veracity of the will is fortified by the fact that there is nothing to prove that the signatures purported to be that [those] of the deceased were made by his own hands,” judge Omondi ruled.
She also said there was also no explanation as to why, even after appending a written signature on the purported will, Kipkessio later appended his thumbprint on the land transfer documents.
“This is why the objectors to the will are so suspicious about the bona fides of that document, which doubt, this court shares,” Omondi said.
In the succession case, Salina Sawe, John Sawe and Christine Sawe, the children of the first wife, sought revocation of a grant allowing Paul Korir and Harron Sawe of the second family to be administrators of the estate.
The three children were represented by lawyer Kaira Nabasenge.
He argued that the purported will was obtained through fraud and the grant on the administration of property was obtained by concealing vital evidence from the court.
Nabasenge argued that an affidavit sworn by Salina Paul Sawe and Harron Sawe failed to disclose that their father had two wives named Tele Bote Kiboliny (first wife) and Elizabeth Sawe (second wife).
The deceased had two parcels of land, namely Nandi /Cheptil/ 138 measuring 37 acres; parcel no LR 7730/8 at Saraiyot measuring 149 acres in Uasin Gishu county and5o head of cattle
While the claim that children of the first wife were sired elsewhere may be probable, it’s not foolproof, for who knows the ways of a bear once it has tasted the original honeycomb? Certainly the deceased’s sons would not know what he released from his quiver or when.
“The deceased was aged 80 and was ailing and could not have prepared a will and the advocate who drew up and attested the will was blind at that time," the affidavits filed by Nabasenge said.
In response, Paul Korir Sawe claimed the first wife left his father and the second family's children were sired by another man. He said such children had no right to the estate.
Judge Omondi overruled his claim, terming it speculative.
She said that although the first wife may have borne the children elsewhere, she later returned with the children to live with her husband who accepted them as part of his family.
“While the claim that the children of the first wife were sired elsewhere may be probable, it’s not foolproof, for who knows the ways of a bear once it has tasted the original honeycomb?
"Certainly the deceased’s sons would not know what he released from his quiver or when," the judge ruled.
She said no DNA tests were done to prove claims on the paternity.
In the will's sharing of the assets, the children of the first wife were only given a small portion, depriving them of the right to an equal share of the property.
Omondi ordered on how the land and assets should be shared.
Members of the first family said they were satisfied.
Members of the second family had no immediate comment.
(Edited by V. Graham)
