Mike Sonko can’t seem to catch a break, with his latest upset coming in the way of a child support lawsuit.
The Mombasa Governor aspirant has been accused of neglecting his 15-year-old daughter, a Form Two student who is yet to report back to school since it reopened on April 26, 2022.
In the case filed at the magistrate’s court in Ngong’, a woman is demanding from the former Nairobi governor monthly upkeep of Sh448,450.
Through lawyer Dan Okemwa, the woman claims Sonko has failed to provide for the child’s basic necessities such as education, good health, food, clothing, shelter, entertainment and medication.
Pending determination of the case, the woman also wants Sonko compelled to pay school fees of Sh86,000 and another Sh30,450 to cater for school-related expenses and uniform and provide medical cover and upkeep for the girl.
She also wants the moneyed politician and businessman to clear the outstanding school fees balance of Sh37,000.
“Mr Sonko and I are the biological parents of the minor herein,” court papers read in part.
The plaintiff argues that their daughter is entitled to equal treatment and provision like his other children.
“The unequal treatment has affected the minor psychologically as she does not understand why her father is abrasive towards her. Besides, the minor has been bullied and ridiculed in school because of her surname thus causing her emotional trauma and has indicated she wants to be transferred from the school,” says the woman.
“Mr Sonko has always been defiant and brazen to accept responsibility and assist me with the maintenance of the minor. He has over the years willfully withdrawn support towards the maintenance of the minor thus denying her what is rightfully hers and forcing me to take full responsibility for the minor,” she adds
The woman tells the court she met Sonko in 1999 and developed a romantic relationship. Though their relationship was on and off, they got the girl on April 17, 2007.
She says they held a meeting in early 2018 at Maanzoni and Sonko gave her Sh100,000 for the minor’s school fees and rent. And when the woman’s mother died in December 2018, he offered financial support to her family.
The complainant notes she is unemployed which has made it extremely hard to raise the school fees on her own given the harsh economic times in the country.
“The Respondent is a politician and high-ranking businessman within the republic who lives a high-end life and is not willing to offer the minor the same kind of life while offering a high-end life to his other children, which is a clear indication of discrimination on his part,” reads the court papers.
She says although Mike Sonko knows he is the biological father of the child, he does not want anything to do with the minor.
“I have always been willing to have a DNA test done to prove the paternity of the minor, a fact which Sonko is well aware of as we have discussed the same on several occasions,” she says in her affidavit.
The magistrate directed her lawyer to furnish Sonko with the court documents, with the case set to be mentioned on May 26, 2022.
