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A quiet businessman who made his fortune moving crates of beer through Nairobi’s backroads has stepped into the spotlight, asking a Kenyan court to freeze one of the country’s biggest corporate deals.
Peter Burugu Gachuru, the founder and chairman of Bia Tosha Distributors, is behind a High Court challenge seeking to block Diageo’s planned sale of its majority stake in East African Breweries Limited to Japan’s Asahi Group. The proposed transaction, valued at about $2.3 billion, would shift control of a flagship Kenyan consumer company with brands that dominate bars, supermarkets and roadside kiosks.
Bia Tosha argues the sale should not proceed while a long running court fight between the distributor and Diageo linked companies remains unresolved. A lawyer for the distributor said the court has certified the matter as urgent and set a hearing for Friday to issue directions. Diageo and EABL did not immediately comment.
The legal clash is only the newest chapter in a career that began inside EABL and later turned into a distribution machine that, by Burugu’s own estimate, helped move a meaningful slice of the brewer’s output.
A Kenyan business profile described Burugu as a former EABL employee who rose from an accounts trainee to lead its distribution and logistics operation before taking early retirement in 1995. He said his company handled roughly 12 out of every 100 cases that left EABL’s Ruaraka factory, a claim that underscored his leverage in a market where whoever controls delivery often controls loyalty.
Burugu’s first big break came during Kenya’s so called beer wars era, when EABL needed reliable hands in Kiambu and parts of Nairobi. He registered Bia Yetu, bought trucks with bank financing and took stock on credit, then later formed Bia Tosha after another distributor in Nairobi’s west folded. He eventually merged the businesses, expanding into Industrial Area, South C, Upper Hill, Hurlingham, Kiserian, Rongai, Juja and the road corridor stretching toward the Tanzanian border.
At its peak, the distributor described an operation built for volume: about 130 workers, around 30 heavy duty trucks, and annual deliveries that it said reached up to 2.4 million cases of beer plus 20,000 cases of spirits. The same profile put the firm’s revenue in one recent year at 4.6 billion Kenyan shillings.
Burugu also broadened his bets beyond beer. Through a real estate vehicle called Mugaa Investments, he has been identified as the developer behind Kiambu Mall, a multi storey retail project that courted national and regional tenants. In past interviews carried by Kenyan business press, Burugu spoke of the mall as an alternative for shoppers who otherwise travel to Nairobi, and the reporting described deals with brands such as Java and health care providers among its tenants.
His public profile, however, is defined less by ribbon cuttings than by courtroom fights.
The distribution dispute at the center of the current petition has been grinding through Kenya’s courts since 2016, touching on territory rights, competition claims and whether payments Bia Tosha says it made for goodwill should be refunded when routes are reassigned. A Supreme Court ruling in the broader Bia Tosha matter reinstated earlier High Court orders and faulted lower courts for not conclusively addressing the issues, sending the case back for priority hearing.
Court records and related reporting describe a relationship that soured as Bia Tosha accused Diageo linked entities of unlawfully repossessing distribution territories and refusing to return goodwill payments, while the brewer side argued contracts were not exclusive and sought arbitration.
Now, with Diageo planning to exit EABL through a sale to Asahi, Bia Tosha is pressing a simpler point: if Diageo’s stake leaves Kenya, the distributor fears any eventual court order could be harder to enforce. The distributor wants Diageo barred from selling or transferring its EABL shares pending determination of the petition, arguing the multinational’s stake is a key asset within Kenyan jurisdiction.
Burugu’s name has surfaced in other disputes as well. In a separate real estate fight reported in 2021, a High Court judge stopped development on a 16.7 acre Runda property amid competing claims involving a collapsed lender and a company linked to Burugu. The report said the land was valued at about 3 billion shillings and ordered the status quo while ownership questions were litigated.
People who have worked around the drinks trade describe Burugu as a hard edged negotiator who understands EABL’s supply chain almost as well as the company itself. His family has also been drawn into the business, with reporting that his daughter, Anne Marie Burugu, took over day to day management as he stepped back.
The outcome of the new challenge could ripple beyond one man’s fortunes. EABL is a bellwether stock in Nairobi, and Diageo’s decision to sell has already put regulators, investors and competitors on alert. Asahi, seeking scale, would inherit not only breweries and brands but also the sensitive politics of distribution, where the distance between a warehouse gate and a neighborhood bar can decide market share.
