Mombasa motor importer Al-Riaz International must pay KSh46.7 million after losing a KSh2.33 billion claim against its landlord, Ganjoni Properties.
A long-running Mombasa commercial dispute has left motor importer Al-Riaz International facing KSh46.7 million in legal costs.
The High Court upheld Ganjoni Properties’ costs award after rejecting Al-Riaz’s challenge.
Justice Ngaah Jairus delivered the ruling on October 2, 2026, closing another chapter.
Al-Riaz had sued Ganjoni Properties and Makuri Auctioneers over losses.
The company describes itself as predominantly engaged in motor vehicle importation and sales.
Its JapaneseCarTrade profile similarly lists it as a dealer and importer.
The profile says it specialises in Japanese used vehicles in Mombasa.
The dispute grew from a bitter fight over Al-Riaz’s Mombasa business premises.
Ganjoni Properties was Al-Riaz’s landlord at premises on Mombasa Island.
The company’s relationship with Ganjoni had already produced years of litigation.
That history would eventually culminate in the massive 2018 compensation claim.
Cars Seized
The immediate dispute escalated in December 2017, when vehicles were proclaimed.
Ganjoni, through Makuri Auctioneers, proclaimed 18 vehicles at the premises.
On January 5, 2018, another 30 vehicles were attached.
The vehicles were estimated at KSh146.865 million in total.
Ganjoni Properties alleged that Al-Riaz owed KSh14.9 million in rent arrears.
Al-Riaz disputed that figure and was subsequently evicted on January 7.
The company then turned its grievance into a substantial damages claim.
It claimed KSh131.9 million for motor vehicles it said were lost.
It also sought KSh14.965 million for fixtures and fittings.
Another KSh24 million was claimed for income lost over three months.
The largest claim involved KSh2.16 billion in alleged lost business.
That figure covered five years from January 7, 2018, according to court records.
The total claim therefore reached KSh2.330865 billion.
The case went to full trial, with both sides calling witnesses.
On November 21, 2024, Justice Julius Ng’arng’ar dismissed Al-Riaz’s suit.
The court found that Al-Riaz had failed to prove its case on balance.
It consequently dismissed the suit with costs awarded against Al-Riaz.
That defeat triggered the next financial battle over legal costs.
Bill Soars
Ganjoni’s lawyers subsequently filed a Party and Party Bill of Costs.
The bill, dated March 8, 2025, initially sought KSh47.113 million.
Al-Riaz did not file submissions opposing the bill before taxation.
Makuri Auctioneers also did not oppose the bill during taxation.
The Taxing Officer consequently treated the bill as unopposed.
He awarded KSh34.948 million as instruction fees to Ganjoni’s lawyers.
He added KSh11.649 million as getting-up fees for the litigation.
Another KSh89,000 was allowed for advocates’ court attendances.
The Taxing Officer rejected some smaller expenses for insufficient supporting evidence.
Those allowed items totalled KSh46.6863 million.
Al-Riaz then challenged the taxation before the High Court.
Its central argument concerned how the value of the case should be calculated.
The company argued that the judgement, rather than pleadings, should determine that value.
It maintained that using KSh2.33 billion produced an excessive instruction fee.
It also challenged the KSh89,000 attendance award and several adjournments.
Finally, Al-Riaz argued that the entire costs award was manifestly excessive.
Ganjoni countered that the entire claim remained contested until judgment.
It argued that its lawyers had defended the full KSh2.33 billion claim.
The High Court ultimately accepted that position.
Full Claim Counted
Justice Ngaah said the law requires careful attention to pleadings, judgements and settlements.
The value should come from those sources before the Taxing Officer exercises discretion.
Here, however, there had been neither settlement nor formal withdrawal.
No part of the KSh2.33 billion claim had been formally abandoned.
The entire claim remained before the court when judgement was delivered.
The judge therefore rejected Al-Riaz’s attempt to retrospectively reduce its claim.
“The entire claim, aggregating Kshs. 2,330,865,000.00, remained live and contested,” Justice Ngaah ruled.
That finding proved decisive for the instruction-fee dispute.
The judge said Ganjoni had faced the burden of defending that entire claim.
Its successful defence therefore justified taxation against the pleaded value.
Justice Ngaah consequently found no error in the Taxing Officer’s approach.
He also upheld the use of Schedule 6 for calculating the instruction fee.
Al-Riaz’s challenge to the attendance fees suffered a similar fate.
The Taxing Officer had reduced the original KSh190,000 attendance claim to KSh89,000.
He reached that figure after reviewing the court record himself.
Justice Ngaah said Al-Riaz had failed to identify specific wrongly assessed attendances.
It also failed to show how the applicable fee schedule had been breached.
The same weakness affected its complaint about adjournments allegedly caused by Ganjoni.
No specific hearing dates or attendance entries were identified by Al-Riaz.
The judge therefore declined to re-weigh matters entrusted to the Taxing Officer.
Yet Al-Riaz did secure one correction, although it changed little.
The Taxing Officer had made an arithmetic mistake when recording the final total.
The three approved items actually added up to KSh46,686,300.
Justice Ngaah treated that mistake as a clerical error requiring correction.
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He invoked Section 99 of the Civil Procedure Act to fix the figure.
The court therefore confirmed KSh46,686,300 as the final amount payable.
The stay of execution previously granted to Al-Riaz was also discharged.
Ganjoni Properties can now obtain a Certificate of Taxation reflecting the corrected amount.
Al-Riaz must additionally pay Ganjoni’s costs for pursuing the failed reference.
The ruling leaves the motor importer facing a substantial financial consequence.
It also establishes an important lesson for parties pursuing large commercial claims.
A dismissed claim does not necessarily lose its pleaded value during taxation.
Where no settlement or withdrawal occurs, the claim’s full magnitude remains relevant.
For Al-Riaz, that principle has translated into a KSh46.7 million legal bill.
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