When it rains, it pours: four bullets that nearly killed him, a crushing hospital bill, incapacitation, lost business, divorce—and now the nightmare of the auctioneer’s hammer.
Misfortune has stalked hotelier William Osewe Guda, the man behind Ranalo Foods, popularly known as K’Osewe, like a shadow.
Last week, the Court of Appeal cleared the way for Guaranty Trust Bank (GT Bank) to auction Osewe’s properties—a four-star hotel in Kisumu and flats in South C, Nairobi—to recover a Sh300 million loan.
If the hammer falls, it will be a good story with a bad ending. However, there might be a twist in the tale, and Osewe’s story will have a happy ending.
Backed by his former wife and three sons, Osewe has fought like a lion.
To some, it might be that Osewe’s rise is a cautionary tale for small businesses not to succumb to the urge to fly too close to the sun just when their wings begin to sprout.
To others, Osewe’s long streak of luck ran out.
A near-fatal shooting in 2016 by a friend who owed him Sh300,000 left him incapacitated for three years, with his business running at under a third of its capacity and hospital bills piling up to Sh10 million.
The blow was compounded in 2020 when the Covid-19 pandemic forced the government to shut restaurants and clubs to curb the spread of the viral disease.
If “humble beginnings” were a badge, Mr Osewe—better known as Ranalo—would proudly wear it, and so would his loyal staff.
The rags-to-riches story of Ranalo has been told many times. Before Lady Luck smiled on him, Mr Osewe began by hawking mshikaki and njugu karanga in the backstreets of Eastlands’ Kaloleni estate in the 1980s.
Given his success, it is easy to assume that Osewe, 67, rocketed to fame on the back of a slick marketing campaign. He didn’t. In fact, there is no evidence he has advanced formal education, let alone formal culinary training.
However, when you listen to him, you sense an uncanny eye for opportunity—a nose for money.
For example, a visit to his former wife’s home in Ukambani would give birth to yet another successful venture in mango farming in 2009.
Today, he owns land in Uyoma, Siaya County, with more than 30,000 mango trees.
“People must eat, even if there is war,” he said in a past interview on his mango farm, urging lakeside communities to use the fresh water they are blessed with and venture into the food business.
It wasn’t a mastery of strategic management or the understanding of the intricacies of the financial world that made Mr Osewe successful.
What he had was a simple idea, executed with uncommon brilliance: cook the food people crave, at a price they can afford, in places they go.
Back then, a well-made plate of tilapia and ugali for the growing middle class was scarce in Nairobi’s central business district (CBD). You either found it in expensive high-end hotels or in vibanda.
Mr Osewe changed that, pulling homestyle African favourites out of home kitchens and onto busy restaurant tables in the city.
He built the K’Osewe brand—literally “the home of Osewe” in Dholuo—not with billboards but with consistency and tenacity. Stewed or boiled tilapia with brown ugali, aliya (sun-dried beef), athola (grilled meat): familiar Luo staples, prepared without fuss and served hot.
A steady stream of loyal patrons followed, and the brand’s legend swelled after high-profile visits by former Prime Minister Raila Odinga and the late Charles Njonjo.
As the queues lengthened, expansion felt inevitable. From the CBD, K’Osewe spread to Upper Hill, Kisumu, and Westlands, turning a single-counter operation into a small chain and a cultural anchor. Business was good. Cash flowed. And lenders took notice.
With momentum on his side, Mr Osewe began to think bigger. He set his sights on a grand hotel in the lakeside city of Kisumu, the Blue Waters Hotel.
Building the hotel was the logical next step for a hotelier who had mastered the city lunch rush and wanted to erect an icon on the shores of Lake Victoria.
Located within the serene neighbourhood of Kisumu’s Milimani, Blue Waters is a prime beachfront hotel with 150 rooms.
On May 12, 2014, Osewe signed a Sh220 million loan agreement with GT Bank, with securities being the Blue Waters hotel and apartments in South C belonging to the hotelier’s family.
The facility was restructured twice—on August 23, 2016 and October 31, 2017—with one six-month moratorium on October 2, 2017.
Two years after signing the loan agreement, on December 1, 2016, Mr Osewe was driving towards Garden City to talk to a friend who had told him he had some building materials that he would use for his Kisumu project, when he took a wrong turn into Garden Estate, bringing him face-to-face with his shooter, he narrated in a past interview.
Since then, his life and business empire took a turn for the worse.
What followed is a series of restructurings that added to the layers of securities.
In addition to the security offered by the two properties, GT Bank and Osewe also agreed on a company-wide floating charge over all Blue Waters’ assets.
There was also a corporate guarantee by Ronalo Foods Limited backed by a board resolution, which means the company itself—through a formal board decision—agreed to stand behind the debt and can be pursued for repayment if Blue Waters defaults.
As part of the restructuring, Ronalo Foods also agreed to channel money into an escrow account for loan repayment. Mr Osewe and his former wife, Stella Mutheu Osewe, also guaranteed the loan personally, which means the bank can demand repayment from them—not just the company—and pursue their personal assets to cover any shortfall.
So far, the bank has only gone after the two properties.
If he survived the four shots from the shooter, he believes his business empire will survive all these attacks.
“It shall be well,” he signed off in a past interview where he narrated his ordeal.
