The widow of the late Starehe MP Gerishon Kirima is embroiled in another court battle over land in Mathira, Nyeri County.
Teresia Wairimu Kirima, whose ancestral home is in Gitunduti village in Mathira, Nyeri County, has now taken on her 90-year-old stepmother in an interesting succession case at a court in Karatina.
The case will be heard on Tuesday, December 5, after being adjourned following an application by Ms Kirima for the case to be closed and reheard. She claimed to have lost some court documents served on her by the plaintiff.
In court documents seen by Nation.Africa , the case was filed on October 3, 2023 by Ms Kirima's nephew, Pastor James Ndei Muthiukure, on behalf of Ms Elizabeth Wanjiru Muthiukure, who is accusing Ms Kirima of allegedly frustrating the succession process to disinherit her children.
Ms Elizabeth Wanjiru Muthiukure, 85, from Gitunduti village in Mathira East who says she has been tossed from one government office to another as she seeks a clearance document from a chief in Nyeri to enable her family file a succession case for her late husband's estate.
Photo credit: Stephen Munyiri | Nation Media Group
Two years ago, the Nation carried a story of Wanjiru who accused some government officials of frustrating her efforts to file a succession case, saying she had been shunted from one government office to another in a futile effort to get documents to enable her family file a succession case for her late husband's estate.
Mrs Wanjiru said she had read mischief that there was a conspiracy to disinherit her and her family, accusing some officials of working at the behest of an unnamed Nairobi tycoon.
In the latest development, Ms Kirima has halted the inheritance case at the Lands court, which was about to make an interim ruling against her after she failed to file her defence.
Through her lawyer, she argued that she had failed to file her defence because she had lost documents served on her relating to the case.
In court papers, Muthiukure accuses Ms Kirima of frustrating the family's efforts in the succession process by using delaying tactics and reneging on an earlier agreement, signed in the presence of a local chief, in which family members agreed on how the piece of land should be divided.
According to the plaintiff, Ms Kirima's termination of the case would be detrimental to his right to ownership of the property.
The Kirima family has been in the media in the past for legal battles over the late tycoon's vast estate.
Mrs Kirima made media headlines in 2013 when she was "deported" to her mother's ancestral home after a fall out with her then ailing husband, an incident reported by the Nation that led to a public confrontation between family members and forced anti-riot police to intervene.
Last month, the Kirima family rejoiced when a court ruled that they were the rightful owners of 1,000 acres of land in Njiru in Nairobi's Embakasi area, which the families occupying the land had been ordered to vacate by December 31.
The judge dismissed claims of adverse possession as unfounded and ordered the settlers to vacate and hand over possession of the land to the Kirima estate, failing which the estate would be free to evict them.
