Police are looking for Mumias East Member of Parliament Peter Salasya over claims he threatened to kill a magistrate.
This is after Kakamega Resident Magistrate Gladys Kiama reported to police Salasya had threatened to kill her.
Police said they had been searching for the MP in vain and now want him to surrender.
He is said to have switched off his mobile phones. His aides said they did not know where he is. Police want to hear his side of the story in the saga.
The magistrate drove to the Kakamega police station on Monday afternoon and reported the MP had confronted her outside the local court and threatened to kill her before he took off.
This was after she delivered a judgment in a small claims court in which he ordered the MP to pay a lawyer Sh500,000.
Police said they had launched investigations into the claims with the aim of getting the MP to “hear his side of the story”.
The court ordered him to pay a businessman Sh500,000 owed to him plus interest accrued since December 2022.
Magistrate Kiama dismissed Salasya’s counterclaim against paying the debt as inadequate, implausible and dissuasive.
The lawmaker will now pay the Kakamega-based businessman Robert Lutta the Sh500,000 he is said to have borrowed after he won the August 2022 Mumias East parliamentary seat.
He was also ordered to pay the cost of the case that ran for less than two months.
Through lawyer Edwin Wafula, Lutta sued the MP on October 23, claiming that he had innocently lent Salasya the money in the hope that he would repay it in two months, but that he had failed to do so.
Lutta told the court the MP had failed, refused, neglected and ignored to refund the amount despite frequent reminders.
Lutta attached bank transfer details, which showed how the money moved from his account to that of the Mumias East MP.
The businessman said he was prepared to use the Civil Procedure Act (Section 38), which allows for the imprisonment of defaulters, to send the MP to civil jail if he is found guilty of defaulting on the debt and persisting in not repaying it.
Efforts to get the MP comment were futile.
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