Bank of India,hospital collude to fleece man in coma millions – Weekly Citizen

Bank of India is in the spotlight over alleged collusion with doctors and other actors to loot millions of shillings from a foreigner who is admitted in Mombasa hospital suffering from stroke.

Bank of India’s Mombasa branch manager Manoj Kumar is said to be at the centre of an intricate plot aimed at sweeping clean the British citizen’s bank accounts at the bank through inflated and non-transparent medical bills from Mombasa hospital where he has been in a coma for the last two and a half years.

Jeremy Franklin, a British citizen aged 80 years was rushed to Mombasa hospital on July 12, 2017 after he suffered a stroke. He was admitted in the intensive care unit for a week before being transferred to a private wing in the hospital under Dr Swaleh Bukhet.

Since then, the patient’s condition has continued to deteriorate in spite of a ballooning medical bill. By end of last month, the cost of keeping the patient in the hospital was a whopping Sh21 million.

When his guardian Said Omar who brought him at the hospital and who all along has been responsible for the patient’s care including payment of bills sought for a medical report with the aim of seeking alternative treatment elsewhere, the hospital and Bank of India reportedly ganged up to frustrate the move.

The head of security at Mombasa hospital, a one Omano, was instructed by the hospital’s administrator Abbas Nasser to block Omar from accessing his patient. He had to seek for a court order through Kithi and Company Advocates.

Bank of India on the other hand has stopped Omar from accessing the joint bank account he operated together with the ailing Briton and from which he had already withdrawn over Sh15 million to settle part of the patient’s hospital bills as per invoices given to him by Mombasa hospital.

On July 22 2019, Omar through Kadima and Company Advocates wrote to Bank of India alerting them of his intention to sue the bank for blocking his access to the account without valid reasons.

And in his demand for a medical report for his patient, Omar has written to the hospital’s administrator through his lawyers Kithi and Company Advocates warning that unless the hospital produces the report, he intends to seek for the court’s intervention.

“Kindly note that our client has been the informal guardian of his patient in your facility since July 2017 to date… Until recently, our client (Omar) was able to discharge his duties pertinent to the patient’s care at your hospital with ease. However, the bank has of late frustrated our client’s seamless discharge of duties and thus will refer his predicament to the courts of law,” the lawyer’s letter dated September 23 2019 to Mombasa hospital read in part.

There are claims that the bank’s manager having realised that the patient’s account contained millions of shillings was allegedly colluding with Mombasa hospital management to ensure the patient continued being held at the facility up to the point his accounts are emptied.

The patient with a British passport number 517899566 who was born at Belfast, England in 1939 has been in Kenya for the last 30 years. Before he fell sick, he had been a researcher on historical sites across Africa.

The bank’s chief executive officer is Sharda Rai who is accused of undermining and underpaying local Kenyan staff and helping Indians in Kenya engage in inside loans trading, money laundering to India and giving unsecured loans to certain individuals classified as golden customers.

Jeremy, a British citizen who has been admitted at Mombasa hospital since 2017. He has incurred a medical bill of Sh 21 million as at this month.