Warning! Kennedy Nari (Hakuna Matata Tours) - swindler

It passed some time since we had our trip in Uganda, Rwanda, Congo in 2010. We've lost some cash but we had a great time, since Africa is beautiful.

But I have a promise to fulfill: on departure I've sent Kennedy Nari (who was the trip organiser) an SMS promising that I would post a detailed description of our experience with him. He replied me with message pleading not to do that and promising to give our money back (around $500 in total) as soon as possible.

We've never got the money and never heard from him since.

So complying with my promise, I completely confirm that Kennedy Nari is a cheater, fraudster, swindler and all the other words which could describe a person who gets the money, delivers you worst quality service possible and dissapears with the rest of cash.

We had it all:
* the hotels were horrendous (the cheapest available in the area);
* the car broke down at least 5 times in places ranging from highways to desolated NPs;
* we were lucky to have sunny weather through the most of the trip - when finally it rained the cabin turned out to be leaking -> we've got a pleasure of sitting under the dirty water non-stop leaking on our heads;

• gorilla permits were never pre-paid and we got them on the day of our arrival (which means the we were very lucky to get them) and given how long they've been checked, re-checked, double-checked by ranger, they might've been fake;
• we got wrong instructions on the visas policies and we totaled around 20 or so hours waiting on the borders (we will call the boss, the boss of the boss will come in an hour, the boss of the boss of the boss will call and help - all this kind of shit);
• in Bukavu we were turned back on the border, cause Kennedy failed to pursuade the guys, so we've lost the whole day in waiting and driving back;
• in the end they asked us to lend them money (bank is closed - what else?);
• the last two days we paid everything ourselves (on top of the initial prepaiment of course);
• the last day we paid for the food and accomodation of the driver and the guide as well, cause Kennedy left them with no cash at all and stopped picking up phone, - although this was the minor cost, but leaving his own people with no food was a bit new experience for us.

Overall: you can deal with Kennedy at some degree, if you limit payments, control your itinerary, control everything daily and constantly (if you like this kind of trips), but if you do this you must consider that you giving money to complete bastard.

Looks like the authorities finally noticed something:
http://www.visitvirunga.org/warning-hakuna-matata-tours-travel/

It's too bad you didn't do a search here prior to your trip as there are several complaints against that guy.

Hey thanks for the message but its better to post it on Congo forum my be it will be better than Uganda forum because that Tour company and its address is for Congo.

Very very sorry indeed! i have seen quite a number of complaints in that regard in the Burundi travel forums too!

Due to overwhelming complaints this company might have closed shop. I tried to browse their website but the domain seemed t have been closed. Though i sympathize with complainant and totally against fraud, i think he should have handled this issue differently.

How? I am of the view that you should have contacted the relevant body in charge of tour operators, if it were a registered company that is, so that that particular individual is dealt with as an individual without affecting several other share holders. Alternatively you should have sued that individual so that he refunds your money, otherwise he might have closed shop now but he is going to register a new company and start cheating again and the cycle continues. Such an individual is supposed to be banned from the industry.

@laketraveller - sadly by the time when I did the reseach in this exact forum Kennedy appeared to look like a very knowledgeable and cool guy. Was hard to assume that he was already on the dark side of the power.

@safarigo - we started our way from Uganda and the guy's been promoting himself as a specialist for the whole East Africa. Furthermore, looks like he's banned from Virunga, so people heading there will unlikely end up dealing with him. But he might try to continue business in other places.

@sandedavid - of course you're right regarding how should the frauders be dealt in the perfect world. But believe me that I have neither resources, nor the willingness to sue someone in the court of the country situated 10-12 hours of flight time from me. I see that you're from Ugandan tourism and I hope that your client catering standards are up to the highest ones. However, during all our travels in Africa I never got any receipt or any other hard financial evidence of payment - I doubt that any East African court would listen to some foreigner's complaints: "I gave them cash, I paid for gas, etc.", - which are not document proven.

Overall I hope that the critical mass of complaints regarding Kennedy did some good for the people reseaching now and will help them to get a better experience than the one we've got.