Kenyan businessman Paul Ndung’u takes legal action over control of SportPesa assets

Paul Ndung’u, a Kenyan businessman and executive, has taken legal action to join the ongoing court case to determine control over assets related to SportPesa, including the trademark and Web domains.

The Kenyan businessman’s move to determine control of assets related to the gaming platform comes nearly two years after the SportPesa brand was relaunched under Milestone, a group controlled by Ronald Karauri and other investors linked to Pevans East Africa, the defunct holding company that pioneered betting in Kenya through the SportPesa brand.

Pevans East Africa ceased operations in 2019 after losing its license for alleged non-payment of taxes totaling Ksh95 billion ($806.5 million) and concerns about increased gambling addiction.

Some of Pevans’ founders, including Karauri, relaunched the sports betting brand, prompting legal action from partners, most notably Asenath Wachera Maina, the largest Kenyan stockholder in the defunct holding company, who accused Karauri of an illegal takeover through Milestone Games.

While participating in the case that will determine the fate of SportPesa’s core assets, Ndung’u revealed that, in addition to being excluded from ownership of Milestone, which now operates the SportPesa brand, his stake in the multinational Sportpesa Global Holdings Limited (SPGHL), which owns gaming subsidiaries in key markets like Tanzania and the United Kingdom, has been diluted.

In an affidavit, Ndung’u said Karauri and Robert Macharia have interests in both Milestone and Pevans, but chose to take actions that are detrimental to the latter without disclosing their conflict of interest to the court.

Since its inception in Kenya more than six years ago, SportPesa, a leading sports news and betting technology company with operations in Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Nigeria, Italy, Ireland, and the Isle of Man, has grown into a global gaming company with more than 500 employees and offices in six countries.

According to court documents presented by Ndung’u, the brand, which was built through heavy marketing and sports sponsorship by Pevans at a cost of more than Ksh5 billion ($42.4 million), experienced massive growth prior to the cancellation of its operating license in 2019.

Before its operating license was revoked in 2019, Pevans had distributed to partners a total of Ksh7.6 billion ($64.5 million) of its profit of Ksh12.9 billion ($109.5 million) over the previous four and a half years to June 2019.

During the 4.5-year period, Karauri and Ndung’u received dividends totaling Ksh1.835 billion ($15.8 million).