A senior official attached to the Ministry of Transport Mr Ben Mwanjulu and Ian Oparanya, governor Wycliffe Oparanya’s son, have been accused of refusing to pay for food and rooms they had booked in a Coast hotel.
The two had visited Ukunda Mombasa early this month and decided to finalise their tour by visiting Diani in South Coast, Kwale County.
Mr Mwanjulu, who works as an admin assistant in the Ministry of Transport arrived in the company of Mr Ian and two ladies, all intoxicated.
“On Saturday, May 1st I received a call from a pal of mine who works for Citizen Tv in Ukunda. He asked me for rates and stated that his colleague’s brother is heading to Diani from Mombasa and would like a place to stay. He then shared the number of the guy with me and I went ahead and gave him a call,” says the hotel manager Tom Kevin.
“Once they arrived in the hotel two guys and two ladies came out of a Toyota Noah. They were all intoxicated and were holding tumblers.”
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They were shown around the hotel and the different room categories, which they expressed satisfaction.
“I asked Ben if they are happy with the room. He stated that everything is perfect and they take two rooms (two adults in a room),” adds Kevin.
According to the manager, the four then proceeded to the beach and all started swimming and having drinks. A few hours later they came from the beach, ordered some food and cocktails, and proceeded to the swimming pool.
“After about an hour I demanded that they go to the reception and pay for the rooms. At that point is when drama started and they changed the story stating that they already booked somewhere else and they just wanted to check the place out. This commotion continued for at least 30 minutes and Ben walked away from the reception saying that we can’t do anything to him. Furthermore, he said that he can pull strings from places we’d never think of. At this point, I called the tourist police Ukunda Police Station and closed our main gate to prevent them from driving off,” explains the manager.
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Police arrived about 10 minutes later and took all the statements.
“While the police were talking to other parties, Ben brought one of the cops his phone and said that it’s the Regional Commander/Commissioner and he would like to talk to him,” he adds.
After that conversation, the police said they were taking all four of them to the police station. The manager asked the head of security to accompany them for a detailed report of what will happen at the police station.
“An hour later I received a call from my security supervisor saying that the police asked all of them to go home since it was late at night and report at the Ukunda police station the following day at 11am. The following day my security supervisor was at the station from 10:30am to 2pm. No one showed up and one of the officers at the station asked him to go home and go back the following day,” he adds.
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The manager was forced to call the tourist police on Monday without getting a concrete response.
“It’s going to two weeks nothing has happened, no OB number, no case,” he laments
“It’s just wrong how such people can just walk in an establishment do whatever they want and walk out. They feel they can just pull out their phones and call people in power to bail them out of trouble. For God’s sake, hotels are struggling to even get guests and pay staff. Why would someone be this cold and arrogant?” he concludes.
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