Njue and priest end property row

John Cardinal Njue and a priest who sued him over the ownership of the multi-billion shilling St Mary’s hospitals have agreed to end the dispute out of court.

Lawyers for Fr William Charles Fryda, a Catholic missionary who initiated the court action, informed the High Court in Nairobi that he was terminating the suit.

Through a constitutional petition filed at the court, Fr Fryda had sued Cardinal Njue as well as the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers Society.

The priest had accused the Cardinal of ordering him to hand over St Mary’s Hospital properties to the Assumption Sisters of Nairobi.

The court on Monday terminated the petition after the priest’s lawyer filed a notice withdrawing the suit.

Lawyers for the respondents did not oppose the termination.

At least two more suits relating to the property dispute between the clergy remain pending, with one at the High Court in Nakuru.

The subject of the disputes is the St Mary’s Mission Hospital properties situated in Lang’ata (Nairobi), Elementeita (Nakuru) and Sagana (Kirinyaga).

Missionary doctor

According to Fr Fryda’s petition that was terminated, the priest has been working in Kenya as missionary doctor since 1991.

While working at the Nazareth Hospital in Kiambu, he was struck by the plight of many poor Kenyans, who could not access medical care due to unaffordable costs, he says. He resolved to find ways of helping the poor Kenyans and informed his Maryknoll superiors in New York.

The doctor priest says he looked for funds and acquired parcels of land in Lang’ata, Elementeita and Sagana for constriction of low-cost hospitals.

He had instructed his lawyers to register a charitable agency in whose name the properties would be registered, but that had not been done by the time he acquired the first piece of land in Langa’ta, according to him petition.

“The petitioner, therefore, arranged with leaders of the Assumption Sisters of Nairobi (ASN) to have the land registered in the name of the ASN’s registered trustees as a stop gap measure,” his petition states.

Later, he registered the St Mary’s Mission Hospital Nairobi as the charitable entity, obtained funds, constructed the hospitals and made them operational, he claims.

When he began constructing a hospital in Sagana, the ASN allegedly informed him that he had no right to be on the properties since all of them were registered in the names of the organisation’s trustees.