Thread by @surambaya

A brief history of the Surayas...[and a career ending tackle by the Nation]:

1/
Sue Muraya started out in the 1990s as a fashion designer and owner of Kenya Fashion Week, making clothes for a variety of clients, including the Kenya Airways cabin crew.

nation.co.ke/business/Insid…

2/
Peter Muraya started a three-floor club in Hurlingham in the late 1990s, called Zig Zag, which failed. In 1998 he brought in American musicians Lost Boyz and Coolio and lost a tonne of money on the gate fees.

[Near-death twitter can recall multiple floors at club Zig-Zag]

3/
Suraya was one of Kenya’s most advertised off-plan developers. Its portfolio includes ~20 properties including Fourways Junction, currently in a court case with the Gatabaki family, the Spring Valley Business Park and apartment complexes off Msa Road & Ngong Road.

4/
People were paying site unseen

“In July 2013, I gathered I my girlfriends and decided to take a road trip,” she says. And off they went to Sucasa, which turned out to be very hard to find, deep inside Mlolongo. When they finally found it, there was no sign of construction."

5/
Overpromising then underdelivering

“Suraya did not deliver what they had promised,” Laurie says. Not only were there no street lights, but the swimming pool they promised was what Laurie alternately describes as “a pond” and “a mosquito breeding ground."

[Loneview render]

6/
The promise...

“I was attracted to the price — Sh14.5 million for a two-bedroom apartment. It sounded like a deal.” And indeed it was, given its extremely prime location. “I should have heeded that warning about ‘when the deal is too good…’” Muchiri chuckles."

7/
The reality...

"By late 2016, Muchiri realised something was very wrong. Construction had stalled completely and they would never be able to lay the foundation, build the structure and finish the apartments by the promised time. "

[The Falls at Riverside June 2019]

8/
Coming to terms...

"Muchiri tried to get the rest of his money back. The Murayas stopped talking to him, while staff would toss him back and forth among them. Muchiri would sit in the Suraya offices for hours on end, waiting for audience with Pete. "

9
Still living it up...

“By this point they had chase cars and mean-looking bodyguards. Pete would drive in in his Range Rover Autobiography, and Sue in a Porsche Cayenne, and neither of them would talk to me.” The starting price for a Range Rover Autobiography, is Sh34.4 mn.

10/

To date, Suraya’s most successful project has been the Spring Valley Business Park, which houses offices and sample show houses. Surayas claim to be the owner and developer of the business park, a mixed-use comprising shops, offices and a four-star hotel. But is it?

11/
But CS James Macharia:
“I have no stake in the Suraya Group of Companies. In 2011 together with two others, (I) acquired the Spring Valley Business Park on Lower Kabete Rd. The offices of Suraya are in that building. They tried buying it but I dont think they've paid for it.”