A Nairobi court has ordered the Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) to pay lawyer Eunice Ng’ang’a for wrongfully listing her in the Credit Reference Bureu (CRB).
Justice James Makau noted that HELB’s mistake had greatly affected the lawyer’s reputation.
Consequently, the national lender should publish an apology in two national newspapers aside form paying her ksh 10 million.
“This court takes judicial notice to the fact that whoever is ever listed by any of the Credit Reference Bureaus (CRBs) following adverse information or report cannot be taken as a person worthy granting a loan or doing business with otherwise. The person loses all respect and dignity,
“I am alive to the fact that an adverse report from CRB is not a light joke, and no prudent business person would go about giving a loan or entering into a business contract with someone who has an adverse report from CRB.”
In its defence, HELB had claimed a system glitch led to wrongfully listing Eunice.
Lawyer Ng’ang’a had applied for the HELB loan in 1995 but unfortunately, she was not able to get it.
Later on, HELB disbursed a loan of ksh 8,000 to Maseno University. However, since Ms Ng’ang’a was not in that school, she did not get the money.
Seeing the board’s policy dictate that a beneficiary has only one year grace period, HELB started pursuing Ng’ang’a from 1996-2016. However, Ng’ang’a was evasive seeing she did not receive the money.
In February 2016, the board managed to reverse the money from Maseno University. However, the board emailed her in 2018 alerting her that they had listed her in CRB.
Miss Ng’ang’a revealed she tried to contact HELB to clear the issue. However, whenever she approached them, the board told her to put her complaint in writing.
In her quest for justice, Miss Ng’ang’a also sued the Metropol Credit Reference Bureu and Trans Union Kenya.
However, the two organizations shifted the blame to HELB further claiming that their only duty was receiving the information and sharing it with relevant stakeholders.
