Lawyer Donald Kipkorir at a past event in Nairobi.
City lawyer Donald Kipkorir has taken Muthaiga Country Club to court accusing the prestigious club of denying him access in violation of his constitutional rights.
Mr Kipkorir said in a petition to the High Court that the denial occurred on two occasions, a move that impeded his work as an advocate and consequently violated Article 10 of the constitution.
Further, Mr Kipkorir said he cannot be allowed to drop off or pick up his children at the club whenever they have family meetings at the club.
“The petitioner has relatives who are members of the club. He cannot attend family functions. Moreover, the petitioner cannot drop or pick his children when they attend family functions with their cousins at the club,” he said.
The lawyer said in the course of his duty as an advocate, he often meets clients outside his chambers to take instructions and Muthaiga Country Club is one such place.
He said he was invited by one of his clients, who is a member of the Club to take instructions in a matter but he was denied entry.
When he asked the security officials the reasons for denying him entry, he said there was no cogent explanation. He was unable to meet the client, he added.
Mr Kipkorir said from his own perspective, the club may have put him on a blacklist of persons not permitted to enter the club.
He said the incident on August 9, 2024, is a continuation of another one that allegedly occurred in October 2022 when he was denied access but was allowed to enter after complaining.
Before he was barred in the recent incident, Mr Kipkorir said he had been attending meetings at the club for more than 20 years unhindered and without any fetters at all.
He said he is not a member of the club and does not want to join but he cannot be denied access to the club to meet his clients who are members of the club.
“Kenya is not a patriarchal patrimonial state, a monarchy, a military state, an apartheid state, a cast state, or a colonial state that governance supports the organic segmentation and discrimination of its citizens as public policy mantra,” he said in the petition.
Mr Kipkorir said Kenya is a constitutional democracy that guarantees the fundamental rights and freedoms of its citizens and the club cannot be allowed to operate like a white man’s entity in the pre-colonial state where Africans were segregated into settings and their core rights were severely restricted and violated.
Besides the denial of access, he said he was asked to leave while being treated “like a stray dog, a homeless hound that had crushed the hallowed grounds of the privileged elite”.
He wants before the case is heard and determined, the court be stopped from denying him access.
The lawyer is also seeking damages for breach of his constitutional rights.
The lawyer said he is an advocate of the High Court of Kenya with over 30 years in legal practice and a member Law Society of Kenya (LSK), East Africa Law Society (EALS), International Network of Leading Trademark Lawyers (INTA), Commonwealth lawyers and First African member of Legalink.
Mr Kipkorir said his integrity is impeccable and unblemished, and has never been accused of corruption or arrested by any law enforcement agency or charged in court with any offence.
During the two incidents, he said he was invited by Ms Gladys Boss, Maluki Mwendwa, Kennedy Odede, Henry Njoroge and Julie Dabaly Scott, who are his clients and esteemed members of the club.
He has named 17 officials of the club in the case.
