A British national who was briefly stopped at Wilson Airport after landing from Eldoret in the company of Kapseret MP Oscar Sudi on Wednesday is a billionaire philanthropist.
Michael Spencer is also an MP who sits in UK Parliament’s House of Lords.
He is the founder of NEX Group, a UK-based business focused on electronic markets and post-trade business that was acquired by CME Group in November 2018.
Sudi and Spencer were with controversial Tanzanian politician and former minister for natural resources and tourism Lazaro Nyalandu.
A manifest seen by the Star shows they were in a chartered flight from Eldoret to Wilson Airport. When they arrived at the airport, they were briefly stopped as police insisted their luggage must be scanned.
They had wanted to use the VIP terminal but were turned back and told to use another area. This angered Sudi as airport officials told him there was no scanner there and they had to have their luggage scanned as a requirement.
They agreed later on after it emerged the airport officials would not allow them pass through. The plane picked the two foreigners from Tanzania on January 2 and flew to Nairobi. They left Nairobi for Eldoret to meet unknown person for undisclosed mission on January 4 and flew back the following day.
The last time Sudi had a similar fracas at the same airport was in August last year when Turkish businessman Harun Aydin was arrested and deported over money-laundering links and illegal movement into and out of Kenya.
Aydin who was traveling from Uganda at that time and was part of Deputy President William Ruto’s entourage that was a few days earlier supposed to fly to Entebbe only for the DP to be stopped from boarding their plane at Wilson.
Officials at that time said that Ruto failed to seek the President's clearance to travel as required by protocol.
In the Wednesday incident, it is still not yet known what the two foreigners were doing in the company of Sudi. He did not respond to our queries.
Nyalandu who was a minister during the Jakaya Kikwete administration, was in November 2020 blocked from entering Kenya by the Tanzanian government on suspicion that he was seeking asylum.
Spencer is a British financial broker, politician and investor who is said to operate a number of business interests in the hospitality, aviation, deep sea fishing and horse breeding industries.
The three left Eldoret for Nairobi on Wednesday at 10am aboard a Pilatus PC-12 private jet tail number 5Y SRI belonging to Sirai Air but operated by East African Air Charters Limited.
The plane had flown from Nairobi to Eldoret on Tuesday afternoon and arrived at the airport at about 4pm according to the company that owns it. “Checking in at Eldoret International- a big, beautiful and empty airport,” said EAAC on its social media pages.
Sudi held a press conference in Eldoret town together with Uasin Gishu governor Jackson Mandago at about 9am on Wednesday.
Once in Nairobi however, it is when the drama happened. Sudi who has had several run-ins with the law has two pending cases in court.
He was arrested in 2020 for engaging in hate speech and offensive conduct. He is also facing another charge of forging academic papers.
-Edited by SKanyara