A Mombasa court has handed a Boda Boda rider seven years imprisonment after he admitted to retaining money that had been wrongfully sent to him.

Samuel Mwithiga aged 27, received the money from a resident from Texas, United States resident. He submitted to the court that he received KSh 200,000 from the sender.

“After l received the money l blocked the sender and bought myself a Boda Boda since l had been employed by someone else as a rider, but after my family inquired about the source of the money, l told them l had won a lottery,” narrated Mwithiga.

“I blocked him on my phone because he kept calling me asking me to refund his money.” Senior resident magistrate David Odhiambo based his judgement on section 35 of the Computer Misuse/Cyber Crime Act 2018:

“A person who intentionally hides or detains any electronic mail, message, electronic payment, credit and debit card which was found by the person or delivered to the person in error and which ought to be delivered to another person, commits an offence.”

Mwithiga has 14 days to appeal.

KRA to gain unrestricted access to your M-Pesa

KRA to gain unrestricted access to your M-Pesa and bank accounts as part of a new strategy to uncover tax evasion. This means KRA could monitor transactions involving Paybills, bank accounts, and apps used for cash receipts by businesses and individuals.

The government aims to collect over Sh350 billion more in tax revenues this fiscal year to reduce the deficit in its Sh3 trillion budget.