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The courts have allowed Juice manufacturer Kevian Kenya Limited (KKL) to proceed with plans to register the Squishy trademark even as it faces opposition from its former partner in the brand targeting children.

Kevian and Squishy Drinks Limited (SDL) are now expected to try to resolve their dispute through arbitration.

In October 2018, the firms entered into a shareholder agreement for the creation of the new entity to be known as Squishy Distribution Limited, which would exclusively distribute the juice.

But they later fell out and Squishy Distribution sought to stop Kevian from proceeding with the registration plans.

After hearing the parties, Justice Mary Kasango said the Squishy Distribution Limited has not shown a case with probability of success.

In her view, having transferred the assets, even if it purported to terminate the agreement, she was unable to find that the firm had the right to claim it still owned those assets, which include the trademark.

Justice Kasango granted the injunction orders as sought by Kevian, which will only be for a limited period, to enable parties begin arbitration process.

“There is also evidence, not contradicted by SDL, that Kevian will suffer loss, in view of the investment it has undertaken, if the injunction it seeks is not granted,” the judge said.

“It is because I make that finding that I hold KKL is entitled to the prayer for injunction.”

Kenyan taxpayers coughed up Sh2.48 billion to pay a Belgian bank for a botched agreement for a fertiliser plant started in the late 1970s, a State audit report shows. In the end, the plant was never built, meaning that the money went down the drain.

A report from a parliamentary watchdog indicates that the latest payment pushed the total amount of money lost over the botched Ken-Ren Chemical and Fertiliser plant to Sh6.33 billion. Kenya had earlier paid Sh3.9 billion to the governments of Australia and Belgium because it had guaranteed the construction of the failed fertilizer plant at Changamwe, Mombasa.

“The Government of Kenya has paid a payment of Euro 21.2 million (Sh2.48 billion) towards settlement of government guaranteed debts incurred in 1970 on account of Ken-Ren Chemical and Fertiliser Company,” the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) says in its latest report on government finances.

Julius Muia, the Principal Secretary at the National Treasury, told PAC that the obligation arose from a case filed at the Court of Arbitration of the International Chamber of Commerce by the Belgian bank known as Ducroire. The court found the government of Kenya liable as a guarantor and ordered it to pay Euro 21.2 million to Ducroire.

The government had entered into an agreement with a now collapsed American firm, N-Ren, to guarantee the construction of a fertiliser plant back in 1970 at a cost of Sh350 million at an interest of 8.5 percent. The debt has since risen to breach the Sh6 billion mark.

Ken-Ren was a joint ownership between Kenya and N-Ren Corporation in which the two entered into several financing and equipment procurement contracts with various Australian and Belgian banks and suppliers. The government was the guarantor.

Dr. Muia told PAC that Kenya had cleared the debts and compensation associated with failed fertilizer plant.

The Treasury argues that Kenya paid the billions of shillings to avoid a negative credit rating that could injure its reputation and lock it out of international debt markets.

“Even though the full amount of the debt is now settled, the committee is deeply concerned that government spent such colossal sums of money on a project which did not take off and against which no value for money was achieved,” Opiyo Wandayi, who chairs PAC, said in the audit report.

The debt obligation arose from the agreement that Kenya signed with the collapsed N-Ren to guarantee the construction of a fertiliser plant at a cost of $42.8 million (Sh4.28 billion). Under the deal, the government and N-Ren Ltd entered a joint venture to form a company registered as Ken-Ren Chemical and Fertilisers Company Limited, which was to manufacture fertiliser for domestic consumption and export markets.

On the advice of N-Ren, Ken-Ren then entered into several financing and equipment procurement contracts with two Australian and Belgium banks and suppliers, with Kenya as the guarantor. The suppliers of equipment and machinery were Coppee-Lavalin of Belgium and Voest Alpine of Australia. However, the fertiliser factory project failed to take off and Ken-Ren was subsequently placed under receivership in September 1978, with the Registrar-General appointed as the official receiver and provisional liquidator.

Kenya still harbours ambitions of building a fertiliser plant to help cut import costs and reduce subsidies needed to make manure affordable for poor farmers. Farming accounts for a third of Kenya’s annual economic output, but the high cost of fertilizer means farmers rely on subsidies or avoid using them, which hurts output. The government spent about Sh5 billion annually to subsidise fertiliser.

Kenya is seeking to develop oil reserves found in recent years, and produce hydrocarbons. Ammonia for fertilisers can be produced from hydrocarbon feedstocks such as natural gas and oil.

Payment of the billions of shillings for the non-existent fertilizer plant comes in a period when the government in struggling to balance its budget, prompting austerity measures. The review of the budget comes at a period when the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) has missed tax targets in a business environment plagued by job cuts and reduced corporate profits.

Kenya experienced tax shortfalls of Sh60.2 billion in the three months to September and internal revenues from fines, payments for passports and marriage fees were below target by Sh24.4 billion.

Pensioners claiming a total of Sh14.9 billion from Standard Chartered Bank of Kenya have hit a brick wall after an arbitration process stalled.

The Employment and Labour Relations Court had referred the matter to the Retirement Benefits Authority (RBA) for arbitration in October 2018 but nothing has been filed to date.

Judge Onesmus Makau had ordered that the matter be heard expeditiously by the authority to exhaust all avenues for recourse before being taken to court.

The RBA said the file never hit their desks as the parties involved drag their feet.

“The matter was never brought to the attention of RBA,” said the regulator’s communications team.

Some 629 retired employees of the bank moved to court last year demanding Sh14.9 billion arising from the conversion of their pension funds. The workers alleged the bank used the wrong procedure in calculating their terminal dues, which resulted in reduced pensions.

They said an actuarial calculation was done on the lump sum equivalent of their net accrued annual pension in their respective dates of leaving employment and found out that the bank had reduced the amount as a result of fraudulent misrepresentation, concealment and non-disclosure of material facts.

StanChart had been sued jointly with 11 others named as trustees of the Standard Chartered Kenya pension fund (first scheme) and Standard Chartered Kenya Staff Benefits Scheme 2006 (second Scheme).

StanChart said it created a new defined scheme in 1999 as a section of the Trust Fund established in 1975, which absorbed all existing employees leaving those who had already retired with the old terms and conditions. In 2006, the lender separated the schemes with the agreement of all the eligible employees.