Until his death, former Nakuru Mayor Josec Thuo carried his Will in his Land Cruiser V8.
Perhaps for fear that it could be altered by his family members, he kept it a secret and none of his known two wives or his children knew about it.
The only person who knew about the existence and location of his last wishes was his trusted driver Robert Kavisu.
According to court documents, he even translated the Will to Kikuyu language and kept both copies in his motor vehicle.
However, three years after his death, the decision by the late mayor to entrust his Will to his driver is now subject of a bitter inheritance battle among his family members.
The family members are fighting over his more than Sh1 billion estate, with properties spread across more than three counties.
Thuo, a tycoon who had amassed wealth since the 1960s, died in December 2021 at the age of 88.
The Will that is now contested covers properties such as the multi-million Abbey Resort in Nakuru, Abbey House in Nairobi, commercial buildings in Nakuru, prime land in Nakuru, Gilgil, Murang’a and Nairobi, among other properties.
The fight among family members of the late politician-cum -businessman has now taken a new twist after a woman emerged claiming that the ex-Nakuru mayor was her father.
Ms Marion Wangui, through her lawyer Owino Oenga, wants a share of the tycoon's estate.
In court documents seen by Nation , the woman avers that Mr Thuo was her biological father and wants the High Court in Nakuru to stay proceedings in the ongoing succession case pending the hearing and determination of her matter.
"Mr Josec Thuo was my biological father and used to take care of me. The other family members knew about my existence," she claims in court papers.
“My father maintained a good relationship with my mother and me. He provided for me and I know his dying wish would still be to provide for me. I even visited him a week before he passed on,” stated Wangui.
Wangui further claims that the former mayor helped her mother secure employment at the defunct Nakuru Municipal Council, the department of social services, where she worked until her retirement in 2020.
"My father at one time assisted my mother construct a home in Bahati, Nakuru County, where we relocated to, after my mother retired. He also helped her start a small eatery business in Freehold area," she further avers in court documents.
"I am shocked my name is not part of a contested Will filed in court. I know for a fact my father held me close to his heart, as he even named me Marion after his late mother,” she states.
Ms Wangui now wants a DNA test conducted to confirm her paternity. She wants the court to direct that samples be taken from a family member to aid in the process.
The emergence of the alleged daughter now complicates the battle that has been raging in court. After Mr Thuo’s death in 2021, a dispute over his estate broke out.
Two nephews Harrison Ngeta and Nahashon Kabiri claimed that the Will by the late Thuo was the original document of the deceased and claimed they were the executors named in the Will by their uncle.
However, the late politician' s wife Susan Wanjiru, her son Nixon Thuo, and daughter Judy Mukami Thuo opposed the move.
They opposed the Will, claiming that it may have been altered to deprive them of a portion of their inheritance.
Ngeta and Kabiri filed the suit in August 2022 and initiated a petition to the High Court in Nakuru seeking probate of Thuo's Will.
They claimed that the presented Will was the original document. Already Ngeta and Kabiri, in their response, filed in court, have dismissed Wangui’s claims.
They said she has no claim whatsoever in respect of the estate. Late last year, Directorate of Criminal Investigations waded into the property dispute after it was invited by the court.
The DCI seeks to obtain crucial information to aide in investigations of the Will contested in court. The DCI is investigating the alleged forgery of the Will left behind by the late Thuo.
Nixon, Thuo’s son, claimed that the signatures on the document were not his father's and do not match.
"I knew my father's signature. It is not on the Will. The signatures on the copies of the Will are forged," he stated in court documents.
He alleged that after his father's death, his driver Robert Kavisu gave him a copy of the Will which was later scanned by his brother Erick Thuo and shared to their emails.
The driver last year revealed in court that his boss had emphasized the need to keep the copies of the Will safe, and three days after his death, he was to give them to Nixon Kariuki (his son from the first wife).
However, Kavisu claims that Ngeta changed the documents and placed them elsewhere in a car he had instructed him to park.
The documents presented in court as evidence showed that it was the driver who had been entrusted to protect the inheritance.
Kavisu told the court that he had known Mr Thuo in 2007 when he worked for him at the construction site of Abey Resort, and he was promoted to his driver in 2020.
It was at that time that he handed him the document and made him read it aloud three times. "That’s when I realized it was his Will,” Kavisu said.
Kavisu said he had to reveal Thuo’s position on the inheritance after learning that there was a property dispute in the family.
Initially, he suspected that things had gone awry after Mr Ngeta approached him and asked him to lean in their favor regarding the property dispute.
Thuo, who served as mayor in the 1990s and in the 2000s, was a pioneer civic leader having started his career during the pre-independence era at the Legislative Council (Legco).
