By Maina Muiruri and Agencies
A Kenyan-Scot adopted by one of the richest women in Europe is fighting for his life after a car accident in Nairobi.
Peter Gloag, 24, who crashed on May 17, was this week airlifted by his Scottish mother Ann Gloag to Scotland for specialised treatment.
Peter is one of the heirs to Gloag’s estate estimated at more than Sh60 billion (£500 million), which ranks her as the richest businesswoman in Scotland.
Gloag found Peter in 1995, then a 10-year-old street boy, sleeping on a garbage heap in Nairobi. She adopted him and took him to Scotland.
She flew to Kenya to be at his bedside at Nairobi Hospital after the Lang’ata Road accident, before evacuating him to Glasgow’s Southern General Hospital. Doctors fear he could be paralysed for life from the chest downwards.
High interest in story
Scottish media, which have taken a high interest in the story, quoted a family spokesman as saying: "Peter was transferred from Nairobi to the Southern General Hospital in Glasgow, where his condition remains critical."
"It is understood it could be a fortnight before Mrs Gloag finds out exactly what damage has been done to her adopted son Peter’s body," said the Scottish Record newspaper.
Gloag has faced family tragedy twice in the last decade. Her first son Jonathan committed suicide in 1999, aged 28, and her ex-husband Robin Gloag died in a car crash in December 2007. She adopted Peter and took him to Scotland where he enrolled at a prestigious boarding school, Morrison’s Academy before going to Dundee High School then Napier University in Edinburgh to study business management.
Peter is a talented footballer and sportsman and had trials with the Glasgow Rangers junior football side when he was 14.
Former nurse and founder of Stagecoach bus empire has poured millions of pounds into charities in Africa, including the Jonathan Gloag Academy named after her late son.
Jonathan Gloag Academy’s pupils donated food and cash worth Sh476,000 to the Standard-Group led Mercy Train charity that gave out relief food in various parts of the country.
Peter is however not the sole heir to her estate. Gloag has a daughter, Pamela, from her first marriage and three step-children from her current marriage to David McCleary.
For her charity work she was awarded an OBE of Scotland in 2004. She has donated £4 million through her Mercy Ships charity, which provides free medical care and supplies to the world’s poor.
