State declines to pay Solomon Njoroge Kiore for supplying State House seats since 1992

 

State House Kenya. PHOTO | TWITTER

Solomon Njoroge Kiore, the owner of Furncon furniture company, is asking Ksh500 million for goods he furnished to the State House in the 1990s during former President the late Daniel Moi era.


Njoroge got the tender and is asking for compensation at the Milimani High Court to end the matter.


The carpenter won the deal to supply State House with furniture in a procurement rule conducted by the Ministry of Defence in 1992.

Furncon furniture company supplied seats. They were returned, later after a year without any payments.


In a mini-State House at the Agricultural Society of Kenya grounds, some of his seats featured. The seats also were in Jamhuri, the Moi Air Base and Eldoret Barracks.


The company also furnished a mace, chairs and several other instruments of the presidency.


The state extended the settlement to Njoroge in 2001. After learning that the carpenter’s interests included financial issues not related to the cost of the chairs, the administration withdrew its offer.

Njoroge went to court in 2007, but it was not until 2018 when the court decided to settle the case out of court.


The settlement came through after the parties declined to concur on the amount to be paid.


In 2019, a military officer Colonel Symon Yator Cheberek took over the case, he, later opposed it saying “There can never be a situation where a civilian can be in court one on one with a notable disciplined uniformed officer.”


In other court documents, Njoroge said that the delayed payment bankrupted his firm and thus it was helpless to seek related assignments in other African countries.


He revealed that he took a Ksh1 million loan for the State House deal, and used his matrimonial home as security.


When he failed to pay, the bank declined to await payment from State House and moved on to auctioned his home.