Father sees men stand trial for Ward murder

AFTER 11 YEARS of extraordinary perseverance, John Ward will see the murder trial of his daughter, Julie, officially open in the Nairobi High Court today. "I am content because everything has been done now that could be done, and the stage is set for a fair and open trial," Mr Ward said of the event marking the end of an affair that has come to dominate his life.

Two men have been accused of the murder of his daughter, whose burnt remains were found in the Masai Mara Game Park, Kenya, in September 1988. Simon Ole Makallah, arrested last year, the former head warden at the reserve, has always been one of John Ward's chief suspects because of the ease with which he led Mr Ward's search party to Julie's abandoned Jeep, and then later to her remains. David Kandula Nchoka, arrested in January, was a clerk at Sands River Camp in the Masai Mara, and one of the last to see her alive. He forged her signature on his books, claiming she left the park in a hurry.

The trial starting today is likely to be temporarily adjourned so that the two cases can be joined together.

Mr Ward has rented an apartment near the city centre. A successful businessman, who reckons to have spent more than pounds 1m on the case, he expressed some unease about the state of the small, poorly furnished rooms, but said he hoped the privacy they afforded would encourage his wife, Jan, to come from Suffolk for the trial. "I'm very tired and weary of it all," he said.

He believes the murder could have been solved much earlier "if our little team had been sent down to the Masai Mara". The highly personal role John Ward has taken in the investigation is something the court will have to consider. After initially exposing incompetence and a string of cover- ups - including a pathologist's report that was altered to claim that Julie was eaten by wild animals - Mr Ward's dogged pursuit, generous personal resources and Western expatriate status eventually led to him becoming an official member of a special new police team set up by the Kenyan Attorney General.

He has conducted interrogations, pursued leads, exposed "serial liars", has laid to rest conspiracy theories put about by members of Kenya's opposition parties, and has forced the country's inefficient and corrupt justice system to take on a case that it longed to drop. With only a little irony, he occasionally refers to himself as "PC Ward".

Mr Ward has explored the under-belly of government, politics and justice in a country burdened by authoritarianism and corruption, and he has had to make difficult decisions to survive the course. "I had to make it clear that I was interested in the actual murder, not in those who tried to cover up; that's a Kenyan problem," he said. He says this compromise was crucial for the success of the investigation.

Murder - and cover-up - has already been proved in the trial of two innocent rangers in 1992. A judge at that time remarked that it was ominous that it took a foreigner "to stir the Kenya police out of its lethargy" and called a cover-up by the police a "blatant abuse of the institutions of justice". The judge said many questions were left unanswered regarding the role of Simon Makallah and David Nchoka - now in the dock.

The issue now is whether 11 years on there is sufficient evidence to convict the men. DNA samples tested in Britain and America have come to nothing, including strands of blond hair, which turned out not to be Julie's. Mr Ward took a last sample to the US just before Christmas, but says he expects no surprises.

"We're proving a negative and cutting off any last option," he said. Of about 40 witnesses on call, six are expected to come from Britain.

While insisting the case has "put Kenyan justice on trial", Mr Ward says he has full confidence, this time round, in the integrity of "a good old fashioned" police team, the judge and the lawyers.

He hopes for a conviction. But it may well be that real justice would have to be an acquittal. Mr Ward says he would be happy with that, too.