BY SAM ALFAN.
Kilifi based preacher Ezekiel Odero has moved to the court to unfreeze his bank accounts a day after the police obtained orders blocking him from touching the funds at least for one month.
The preacher wants the court to discharge and unconditionally set aside the orders issued yesterday.
He argues that the decision by the police to file the application in Nairobi was calculated to embarrass the High Court in Mombasa, since he has filed a petition challenging plans to freeze the accounts and closure of a radio station run by his church.
“The most embarrassing of them all is that the state herein did not make full disclosure of the events prior to the filing of the application and did not bother to make any mention of the case that is pending for trial at the High Court at Mombasa,” the preacher said.
He argued that the court ought to even have taken note of the fact that the case was still alive in Mombasa High Court and the magistrate should not have been a hurry to grant the freeze orders.
“This application be certified as urgent, heard and directions given for its expeditious disposal as the circumstances of the case dictate,” he pleaded in the petition.
He revealed that he filed the case before the High Court and sought for reliefs which are substantially the same ones issued to the DCI, to forestall his case.
Odero said the state mischievously sneaked and sought for the orders without disclosing to the magistrate that there was an active case pending in Mombasa.
“The orders issued will bring hardships and catastrophic effects on the petitioner’s part if executed and or not discharged and the orders will embarrass the High Court in the just, fair and efficient determination of the issues before it thereby embarrassing all the institutions in due process,” he said.
The televangelist said the government will suffer no prejudice if the bank accounts and MPesa accounts are unfrozen.
On the flip side, the freeze will see the closure of Kilifi International schools due to inability to pay fees and feed over 2000 learners.
He further states that his lawyers advised him that the courts ‘hierarchy should be respected and there is no way a mere subordinate court can delve into weighty issues that the superior court is handling, unless the subordinate court wants to embarrass itself.
