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Stanley Githunguri who breathed his last on Wednesday night was a stickler to time and good grooming.

Nothing infuriated Githunguri as much as a person on an appointment with him walking into his office late. 

And worse still, Githunguri, though in his life time assisted thousands of the downtrodden in society, never entertained shabbily dressed individuals. 

Always dressed in Italian designer-made suits with a watch on a golden chain dangling down his neck, Githunguri was known for his British mannerisms.

His allies fondly referred to him as Stano,

The prominent businessman and tycoon was also popular for owning a number of assets including Lilian Towers on Nairobi’s University Way.

He is remembered to have been among some of the few close friends of former Attorney General the late Charles Njonjo, with whom they shared many similarities, particularly in dressing styles and British mannerisms. Throughout his life, Githunguri preferred employing Kenyan-Asians as his secretaries and accountants because he never believed that an African could keep time. 

Those who knew him say Githunguri was always punctual at his Agip House office, where he could arrive as early as 7am and leave at around 9pm.  “If he gave you an appointment of 9am and you arrived even five minutes past that time, the appointment stood cancelled and pushed to another day that you could keep time,” one of his allies, George Kamau alias Rodgers said.

Kamau is a former councilor at the defunct Kiambu Municipal Council. 

The former civic leader who mourned his former friend as “a man with a humane heart but firmly principled,” says Githunguri never entertained laziness, lateness, being unkempt and people who broke the law. It was because of his principles that he remains one of the few individuals from Mt Kenya region who stuck with former Prime Minister Raila Odinga since the onset of multi-partism and bankrolled him until in this year’s General Election. 

The former Kiambaa MP died at a Nairobi hospital aged 77 years after battling several ailments.  Though his family declined to comment on his demise, some of his relatives who spoke on condition of anonymity readily confirmed the same.  

Born in 1945, Githunguri was raised by his mother Lilian Nyagaki after his father died when he was 14 years old. 

Menial jobs

He attended Gacharage Primary School before proceeding to the then Karuri Intermediate School.  He briefly discontinued learning due to financial challenges and joined his mother to do menial jobs. The billionaire later, through well-wishers, secured a scholarship and joined St Mary’s High School in Alaska, US. 

The ambitious Githunguri then joined Yampa Valley College for undergraduate studies in Kansas before proceeding to the Methodist University where he graduated with a master’s degree in Political Science and Economics. 

He returned from the US in 1972 and was hired as a District Officer. 

It was not long before he fell out with some of his seniors in the provincial administration, among them, then Eastern Provincial Commissioner Eliud Mahihu. 

After the fallout, he secured a six-month training at the Kenya Institute of Administration, after which he was posted to the Coast region and stationed at Kipini in Tana River district. It was in Kipini that he first ventured into business. A local beer distributor encouraged him to open a bar. Later on, he opened an outlet to sell mnazi (palm wine) making Sh4,000 in profit in the first three months.  Before joining civil service, Githunguri had signed a Sh4,000 bond to ensure he worked for the government for four years. 

 Now that he had enough money to pay for the bond, he decided it was time to quit the civil service. He dispatched a signal of his resignation to Mombasa and left without waiting for a response. Back in Nairobi, he was recruited as a management trainee by the National Bank, which later sent him to Britain for a nine-month course in banking.  

It was upon his return that he was posted to Nakuru as the branch manager. It was here that he met Mzee Jomo Kenyatta and, with time, they became firm friends.

It is believed he was among the last people Mzee Jomo Kenyatta spoke to on the phone on August 22, 1978, the day he died.  As he rose through the ranks, Githunguri was involved in numerous business ventures that included farming, real estate and hospitality. Even when he was transferred to Mombasa, Mzee Kenyatta continued consulting him for his banking needs. 

Many are the occasions Mzee Kenyatta would bail him out whenever he ran into problems with various State organs.

One such occasion was when he bought the plot where Nairobi’s iconic Lilian Towers stands in.

It turned out that there was a 1954 council by-law that prohibited the construction of more than six floors in the vicinity of Central Police Station.

Through Kenyatta’s intervention, the law was revoked to enable him construct the iconic building. 

Life changed for Githunguri after Kenyatta’s death. His relationship with the new President Daniel arap Moi was cold.  

After he left the National Bank in the early 80s, Githunguri spent the next decade battling the government in protracted court cases in what he always insisted were politically motivated prosecutions. 

He had to seek court protection on several occasions.

 One such case was an accusation that as the CEO of National Bank, he had violated exchange rate rules.

The court cleared him of the accusation only for the case to be revived five years later.  He was to later join politics in Kiambaa where he unsuccessfully vied for the parliamentary seat but lost to the late Njenga Karume.  However, in 2007, he recaptured the seat from Karume before losing it to the late Paul Koinange in 2013.  The incumbent Kiambaa MP John Kawanjiku, in his message of condolence, mourned the lawmaker as a dependable leader whose undivided focus was the unity and progress of the country.  “I interacted with Githunguri when I was a very young man, he was a dedicated leader who was committed to the welfare of his people,” Kawanjiku said.

Kawanjiku narrated how the billionaire valued education and that through his Githunguri Foundation, he educated over 20,000 bright but poor students from Kiambaa.

Among his successful businesses are the Ridgeways Mall and prestigious Nairobi Safari Club.  Recently, in a multi-billion property row, two of his daughters Lillian Nyagaki and Lillian Wanjiru had disclosed to the court that he (Githunguri) was suffering from dementia and blood pressure. 

They further disclosed that he was battling diabetes and that he had also undergone a kidney transplant.