A crime syndicate involving foreign nationals and corrupt government officials extorting businesses and grabbing land in Malindi and Kilifi counties has been exposed.
The syndicate also involves lawyers, who are used by foreign nationals, mostly Italians, to transfer land and company shares illegally and deny legal owners access to their properties, particularly in parts of Malindi.
Circulating information suggests that Renzo Quaciari, an Italian national, is behind the syndicate.
Mr Quaciari is the director of Denman Properties Limited, a local firm incorporated in the country.
In one instance, Renzo allegedly worked in cahoots with rogue officials at the Registrar of Companies to delete the names of his two Italian colleagues – Marco Alimonti and Pusterla Giuseppe – all directors of Holborn Properties Limited from the register.
In the process of attempting to take illegal possession of the firm based in Malindi, the Italian also reportedly duped the Registrar of Companies that Marco and Pusterla had resigned and their shares transferred to him.
In a letter dated February 3, 2022, written through lawyer JK Mwarandu and Company Advocates and Commissioners for Oath, Marco who holds 200 ordinary shares in Holborn Properties Limited said he came to find out that he was no longer a shareholder nor a director of the company in December 2021.
He maintained that contrary to what was indicated in the Registrar of Companies register, he never transferred his shares to anyone and neither had he resigned from the company as a director.
In the second case involving a firm Denman Properties Limited, the Italian national was said to have defrauded the two directors Marco and Pusterla by illegally transferring their shares and submitting a forged letter to the Registrar of Companies purporting that the two had ceded their stakes and tendered resignation as directors of the company.
The two renowned foreign investors in Malindi have since maintained that they never resigned nor did they transfer their shares.
The two also are co-directors of Bayview Properties Limited and Paddington Investments Limited, both based in Malindi and which were also affected after the crime syndicate invaded them in the extortion ring.
Giuseppe Pusterla who also owns Casuarina Commercial Centre Limited and Antiochia Limited has also lost his two firms to the Renzo syndicate after his shares were illegally transferred to unknown people and his directorship forfeited without his consent.
Sources familiar with the crime syndicate confirmed that Renzo has the tendency of using his foreign colleagues to register firms involved in the property business in Malindi but later he turns against them transferring their shares illegally.
In the above cases, Renzo allegedly waited for the victims to travel outside the country before initiating the evil plan.
Sources say that Renzo would reportedly call other shareholders telling them that the Kenyan government had put them on red alert and that they would not be allowed to travel back to Kenya.
He later allegedly manipulated the companies’ shares to his benefit after he forced his victims out of the companies.
