Billionaire Vimal Shah gets candid and personal with #KOT
Billionaire Vimal Shah, the chief executive of Bidco Oil Refinery, got personal and penned a letter to Kenyans on Twitter.
The letter, posted on Twitter on Friday, was in response to allegation of land grabbing in Uganda where the company is setting up a palm oil project.
He started by saying; “You have probably heard and seen a lot about Bidco and myself on your timelines over the last few weeks. Let me clear things up.”
“I have become the target of a deliberate SMEAR Campaign by a certain clique of individuals who will apparently go to extraordinary lengths to besmirch my name and that of Bidco. These matters are in court and we have already obtained gag orders that are being blatantly ignored…
“In the meantime the nonsense will keep coming as people get nervous and I ask you to ignore it. I certainly have so far and will continue to do so, the CEO wrote.
LEASED LAND
He continued to say; “Our palm oil project in Uganda is a Public Private Partnership with Oil Palm Growers-1700 plus – on Kalangala Island and the Ugandan Government.
“The Government leased the land for the growing of palm to the project. We were not involved in any land transactions in Kalangala.”
He added that the project was doing well and is helping Uganda become self-sufficient in vegetable oil production.
“We struggle to understand how people who employ exactly zero Kenyans have become experts on how to lead business. (Proxy accounts do not count as jobs),” he continued.
In September 2015 the billionaire sued controversial blogger Cyprian Nyakundi, Aly Khan Satchu, Artem Gurevitch, Preston Menenhiall, Stephen Jennings and RG African Land Limited for defamation.
The case is still in court.
