THE REAL STORY OF BARACUDA AIRWAYS AND JOHN MAJIWA’S CON GAME

I am one of the pilots who became a victim of John Majiwa’s con artistry. I jumped on the bandwagon of Baracuda Airways (of course as a passenger being taken for a ride) in September 2016. I had heard of Baracuda through some friends of mine working at Wilson Airport. At the time, Baracuda Airways had an office at Wilson, so I made calls and finally met Majiwa. When I met him, he explained to me that Baracuda Airways was a start up airline with shareholders in Emirates, Spain and Finland. He even name dropped the prince of Emirates. He added that he was the Group Managing Director of Baracuda holdings and the airline was just one of the many assets the company has. This included among other things, hotels in Rwanda, Entebbe and Dubai and soon there will be an amusement park comparable to Disney World here in Nairobi, for which they had already secured land. On further probing on whether there were any Kenyan investors, he said that Uhuru Kenyatta’s family and deputy President William Ruto were the main shareholders here in Kenya. He also explained that he was in the process of procuring five aircrafts in total, three of which (A CRJ, Bombadier and a Boeing 737) will come in this year.

When I went back home I started reflecting on what Majiwa had told me. The internet is a free resource, so I Googled Baracuda Airways and it gave me results. One of the results was a flight that Baracuda had done from Nairobi to Homa Bay in January 2016. The piece in the news article even quoted a governor praising the launch of Baracuda Airways. At first I had my doubts about it because I had not seen the aircraft with the name Baracuda. But then Majiwa raised the credibility of the fictitious airline by appointing a few people from the aviation industry from other companies. For instance he appointed a guy called GK as Chief Executive Officer and a guy named Alex as the Chief Operating officer. Alex was a former director of Safety at Kenya Airways and a close associate of Naikuni. He worked for Baracuda Airways for 3 months and was not paid for the period he worked. I’m told that one day, Alex woke up to go to his office at Wilson Airport and found the Baracuda Airways offices locked. Apparently, it had been locked for defaulting on rent. So it’s from that point that GK, Alex and those at Wilson knew the airline was a hoax, so they backed out.

In December 2016 Majiwa started the second phase of his racket and this time round, he upped his game even further. He hired a recruiting firm by the name Duma Works and used it to hire cabin crew and pilots. Duma Works were given instructions that as soon as they get CV’s, they ask the crew to pay into the Stanchart Account belonging to Baracuda. So the agency recruited and ensured that crew had paid before they were interviewed. This is where you could start seeing the absence of normal and the presence of the abnormal. The first batch of pilots paid Ksh 2.5 million then the second batch were told to pay Ksh 1.7 million and the cabin crew were told to pay Ksh 250,000. I personally paid 1.5 million and was due to pay the additional 200,000. When we were having discussions amongst ourselves as to whether or not we should pay, most of the pilots and crew did not have any qualms with paying this money apparently because Kenya Airways had set a trend similar to this. Seven of the cabin crew who were recruited by Baracuda Airways even added that they were selected by Kenya Airways, told to pay 300,000 and even after that they were not offered a job. It turns out he did not pay Duma works for this job as he issued a cheque that ended up bouncing.

Majiwa then went ahead and put in some swag in his scheme. He set up an induction and orientation session at the renowned Weston Hotel. He appointed his girlfriend Barbara Alwena as the Head of Inflight. Majiwa claimed that Barbara was a Flight Purser in Qatar Airways, which is doubtful because she does not look like a cabin crew, let alone a Qatar Airways cabin crew. He also hired two trainers on consultancy basis. One morning at Weston, Majiwa brought in a former Jetlink pilot (an Eritrean national) as the Chief Executive Officer. This guy later turned down the position of CEO and decided to take up the position of COO before he smelt a rat and fled. It is at the same Weston hotel that Majiwa introduced us to the Board of Directors of Baracuda Airways. They were about 6 directors. One of them is a former Kenya Revenue Authority deputy commissioner general. I later came to learn that none of the Board members were shareholders except Stella Amaya, whom Majiwa claimed was the liaison of the Prince of Emirates (the biggest investor). I have read stories in the media that Mr Kimeria was arrested as part of the Majiwa’s fraudulent group but as far as I know that is not accurate. Majiwa decided to make him the acting CEO as he looks for a replacement. So he was an employee like the rest of us and now he is a victim of circumstances.

The third phase of Majiwa’s Ponzi Scheme was initiated in January 2017. At this stage, he set up Baracuda’s office around Yaya at a place known as CBC next to Hashi petrol station. He also went ahead and was somehow able to convince Kenya Civil Aviation Authority (KCAA) to grant him an Air Service License and allocate Baracuda Airways local routes to fly and the routes were gazetted in the Kenya Gazette dated January 13th. How he got this far, I will never know. At this point, who would cast any doubts on this scheme? In fact, this is where I feel that KCAA should be held responsible for Majiwa fleecing innocent unsuspecting Kenyans of their money. If Majiwa was the bus driver of this nicely tucked deception, then KCAA was the bus conductor urging passengers to get in.

To demonstrate Majiwa’s sophistication in his scheme, it was in this Yaya office that he was able to bring an expatriate from Cape Town, South Africa and introduced her as the Chief Financial Officer (CFO). I believe this was to serve as a confidence booster to any doubters out there. Majiwa acquired a 4-bedroom serviced apartment in Kilimani and put her there as a tenant. A week after her arrival, Majiwa said that it was important for us to go for a team building retreat at a place called Dove Nest in Naivasha. He said that this was the best way to get to know each other and our roles. It is during this time that I got to know the CFO better and she told me that before coming to Baracuda, she was working as a Financial Analyst for British Petroleum (BP) in South Africa. I tried my best to know a lot of people as I knew after we start flying (It never came to pass) I would be busy and won’t have the time to know administrative staff. This was also a great opportunity to understand the organization’s operations better and enjoy, after all, the retreat was fully paid for. Oh! Wait a minute! You guessed right! Another case of a rubber cheque from Majiwa. He paid Nothing, Nought, Zero, Zilch, NADA!!

After two weeks, this lady who had been brought in from South Africa disappeared. Shock! I found out that she had been thrown out for non-payment of rent. Her personal belongings were confiscated and the lady had to seek refuge at the South African Embassy in Kenya. Surely, who would have the guts to lure a lady all the way from South Africa to Kenya deceiving her that she is coming to work as a CFO? Only John Majiwa! A few days after this incident, one of my colleagues went to the Yaya office and found it locked and the “Baracuda Airways” signage removed. He was told by the caretaker that the office had been locked for defaulting on rent. I tried reaching Majiwa but his phone was switched off. I tried reaching him throughout the day the following day but he was unreachable. This is when my fears were confirmed. My adrenaline kicked in. I called a few of my colleagues and I told them we urgently need to report this matter to the police so that investigations can be launched.

To summarize this story, Majiwa’s bus crashed with myself and others inside. My 1.5m is gone. Yes, he has been arrested but I don’t know if KCAA, the bus conductor will be held accountable. But we hope justice will be done!

Ngai!

Yaani even well schooled people can be conned in this manner.

Guess what that GK mentioned therein is known to me.I even have his card somewhere bearing his CEO Title.He has never uttered a word about this.So not sure if to pick up the topic with him.

The Alex there sounds like Alex Avedi, kweli men are gullible hata wale wamesome!!!

The greed is this country is out of proportions. Pesa iko Kenya, wacha wajanja wapewe