Akinyi Arrested Over Suspected Drug Trafficking

The three were arrested on Wednesday night during a raid at Akinyi’s Deep West restaurant in Nairobi West and are being held at Muthaiga police station. 
 
Police have submitted samples of substance recovered during the raid for tests and further analysis at the government chemist.
 
No decision has been made yet on whether to charge the four in court. 

Akinyi came into the limelight after she was involved in multiple public spats with her enstranged husband, deported Nigerian businessman Antony Chinedu, who was suspected of drug trafficking.

Chinedu, who had been in the country for 15 years, shot into the limelight as a wealthy but esoteric tycoon embroiled in a bitter battle for property running into hundreds of millions of shillings with Akinyi in 2008.

BRIEF CEREMONY

A few years after stepping into the country — the actual dates remain sketchy — Chinedu met and fell in love with Akinyi, and together the two had two children before they got married.

In 2004, they decided to formalise their union at the Attorney General’s chambers, followed by a brief ceremony to mark their marriage.

With their papers in order, the couple then embarked on an investment spree, starting with two mansions in Jacaranda and the buyout of the popular Deepwest restaurant off Nairobi’s Lang’ata Road, which they renovated and re-opened in December 2005.

However, the strong foundation of their union started to crumble in public when Chinedu moved to court seeking to divorce Akinyi, citing cruelty, adultery, and desertion of their marital home.

In the suit, Chinedu accused MP Raphael Wanjala of flirting with his estranged wife and annexing his Ksh 300 million property.

Wanjala denied the claims but was caught on camera leaving a city hotel after meeting Akinyi.

FORGED PASSPORT

Then, in October 2008, Wanjala and Akinyi were arrested at New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi Airport on allegations that they were part of a money laundering racket.

Police found the equivalent of Ksh 7.5 million in US dollars on them.

India requires one to declare amounts of money above Ksh 375,000.

After further investigation, police in New Delhi established that Akinyi and Wanjala had left Kenya through Uganda and flown into India from Dubai aboard an Emirates flight, and that Akinyi was using a passport bearing another name.

After a month’s stay in prison, the Indian authorities cancelled bail granted to them and took them back to Tihar Prison, India’s second largest jail, where they stayed for another five months before Nairobi intervened.

By Maureen Murimi