High Court allows gov’t to take Sh102 million gifted to Felista Njoroge by Mzungu lover

Big win for the government as High Court  allows agency to confiscate a Sh102 million love gift sent to 23-year-old student Felista Nyamathira Njoroge by her billionaire boyfriend abroad.

In a judgment handed down by Esther Maina on Thursday 25 May 2023, the Kenyan government was allowed to keep the money held in two co-operative bank accounts belonging to Nyamathira after it was established that the gift was the product of money laundering.

The judge ordered the confiscation of the funds because the source of the money from billionaire Marc De Mesel, a Belgian YouTube crypto personality, had not been explained and disclosed.

In a landmark judgement, Justice Maina said the philanthropist had been given the opportunity to explain how he earned his money, which he lavishes on young women around the world, but failed to do so.

Justice Maina said in the absence of the explanation, the state was benefiting from the money secretly wired into the country by the overseas crypto-personality.

While granting the application by the Asset Recovery Agency (ARA) to declare the funds as proceeds of crime, Maina said the evidence adduced in court by both the state and the two lovers showed that there was obvious money laundering.

“I have analysed and gone through the evidence tendered by the boyfriend and it did not show the source of the funds that were transferred to the Kenyan girlfriend,” Judge Maina ruled.

She added that in the absence of disclosure of the source of the funds, the likely conclusion is that the source of the money is money laundering.

As a result, she said, the court has no option but to order that the money in the two bank accounts be forfeited to the state.

Nyamathira hit the headlines in 2021 when she revealed that DCI detectives had intercepted a gift of money sent to her by a Belgian lover.