from: Ouko joachim omolo
The News Dispatch with Omolo Beste
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 31, 2013
Although it was a good beginning for President Uhuru Kenyatta on Thursday handing out some of the 60,000 title deeds to Coast residents who have been landless for years, a lot needs to be done to solve land problems once and for all in Kenya.
In Taita-Taveta County, President Uhuru is to address the massive invasion of private land by squatters following a land crisis allegedly caused by influential families who own large chunks of land, including the Kenyatta family, which owns 30,000 acres and former MP Basil Criticos, who has more than 3,000 acres.
The fact that the idle land held by the Kenyatta family in the counties of Taita Taveta, Kwale, Lamu and Kilifi are essentially speculation holdings underneath which lie multi-billion-worth of natural minerals, it will be indeed acid test for him to surrender some plots to landless in these areas.
The secret to this wealth which is believed to have been shared to Jomo Kenyatta by outgoing British colonialists in secret pre-independence deals –following prospective studies done by British Geologists in the 1950s indicates that Kenyatta’s relative Beth Mugo has been actively involved in privatization of these mining concerns.
The Kenyatta family specifically sits on 74,000 acres of Taveta and 30,000 acres of Taita land underneath which lie gemstones and minerals like Niobium, Tsavorite, Ruby, Sapphire, Tourmalines, Rhodolites, Kyanites and about 40 agro-minerals minerals like limestone and phosphates.
Since as per the 2009 census, a majority of Taita Taveta’s population of 300,000 live in dire poverty (66 percent) while remaining disenfranchised from ancestral land that they could be farming – by 2 families but occupied by the Kenyattas and the Criticos, unveiling this truth might be too painful for Uhuru to do.
The story of Kwale and Kilifi is similar – a sad case of gross expropriation of land from poor natives. This is the same tale recently witnessed at Narasha (Ol Karia), so it is the speculation that the Jubilee government of Uhuru Kenyatta is planning to completely privatize these mining concerns to rake in huge multi-billion payoffs and also to buy into stake-holdings of incoming mining companies.
Unfortunately, when it comes to the land problem issue in the Coast it is not only the Kenyatta family and the Criticos, but also Arabs. This is particularly the period leading up to the declaration of protectorate status over East Africa on August 15, 1895 when indigenous communities (mainly the Mijikenda) were driven out of their ancestral land by Arabs invaders. These were either seeking to establish permanent settlements as a way of consolidating trade with Asia and Middle East or looking for slaves.
Also in 1886 when British and German governments established the Mwambao and ceded control over it to the sultanate of Zanzibar, the 1895 declaration law made the indigenous communities within the Mwambao landless
Against the background that President Uhuru Kenyatta faces an acid test in resolving the squatter problem at the Coast, perceived to be one of the reasons for Jubilee Coalition’s poor performance in that region during the March 4 General Election.
Leave alone poverty and conflict in Mombasa, Kilifi, Kwale, Taita Taveta, Tana River and Lamu counties blamed on the thorny matter of landlessness. Sixty thousand title deeds are not even enough to cater for all landless in the Coast.
Mombasa, Kwale and Kilifi leaders have openly stated the region rejected Jubilee in the General Election because its leaders were perceived as reluctant to effectively address the land question.
In Mombasa County alone, thousands squatters on the 930-acre Waitiki farm and several other areas need to be settled.
While the owner, Mr. Evanson Kamau Waitiki, has threatened to kick out more than 100,000 people from the disputed land, National Land Commission (NLC) chairman Dr. Mohamed Swazuri says the commission was not involved in the negotiation for the Waitiki land as it was being handled at the ministry level.
Even though in June last year, the High Court gave the Mazrui family the right to own the over 3,000-acre land causing panic among the squatters occupying it, the Mazrui family was awarded full rights to reoccupy the land after a 21-year protracted legal battle that began in 1989 when the then government cancelled the Mazruis’ title issued more than 100 years ago.
This is not to mention up to 75 per cent of Kilifi residents who are living as squatters on their own land, leading to the crisis. Here more than 800 squatters living on a disputed 100-acre land at Mtwapa needs to be settled immediately.
Coast leaders however, see the directive of Uhuru and Ruto to issue title deeds as covering up land grabbing in the Coast because it will preempt the ongoing investigations of historical land injustices by the National Land Commission.
The leaders want the Jubilee Government first to carry out thorough audit of land ownership in Coast before issuing title deeds, saying the government should seek lasting solution to the land question in Coast.
They have also accused president Uhuru and Ruto of playing politics with the people’s problems in Coast by issuing title deeds to gain popularity but not to help locals. If this allegation is true then Uhuru and Ruto have a long way to solve land problems at the Coast.
Currently only three foreigners owning land on a 99-year lease at the Coast have come forward to seek regularisation from the National Land Commission.
In an ongoing audit of foreign land ownership, 20 non-citizens across the country have heeded NLC’s orders and presented themselves to the commission.
There has been minimal response from foreigners to seek regularisation of land leases with the commission as they only have 23 days remaining to be registered afresh and ensure their leases do not exceed 99 years.
NLC chairman Mohammad Swazuri has already said categorically that foreigners were required to have their land leases of more than 99 years cut back with effect from 2010 when the current Constitution took effect. Most of the targeted leases are in Coast, Rift Valley and Nairobi regions.
Swazuri has already ordered land registrars in the country to compile lists foreigners with land of more than 99 years lease to be forwarded to the commission, saying that it was a constitutional requirement for all non-citizens owning land of more than 99-year leases to be regularized.
Some foreigners are known to own exclusive and prime islands at the Kenyan coast. The commission has also announced that non-citizens who have not utilised the land within the 99-year lease would not have them renewed. Instead, the commission would convert such land into public property. This is likely to spark a lot of objections from land owners.
According to Swazuri, renewal of the lease will be based on how a non-citizen has been utilising the land for the said period. Most of these lands are idle and it means that they will not be renewed. In such a case is the land Uhuru and Ruto are targeting to resettle the landless.
Governors Amason Kingi (Kilifi), Ali Hassan Joho (Mombasa), John Mruttu (Taita-Taveta), Hussein Dado (Tana River), Issa Timamy (Lamu) and senators Omar Hassan (Mombasa), Boy Juma Boy (Kwale), Mvita Mshenga (nominated senator Kilifi), Emma Mbura (nominated senator Mombasa) and Salim Mvurya of Kwale have supported the President’s action to issue the title deeds to landless people in the region.
President Kenyatta has promised that his government will issue 3 million title deeds to Kenyans in the next five years. He says the title deeds which have remained in the government lands registry since 1964 have been given to the concerned squatters free of charge.
President Kenyatta said during his campaigns with his deputy, they promised coastal people that they will issue them with title deeds for the lands they own and said the exercise had started.
Fr Joachim Omolo Ouko, AJ
Tel +254 7350 14559/+254 722 623 578
E-mail omolo.ouko@gmail.comFacebook-omolo beste
Twitter-@8000accomole
Real change must come from ordinary people who refuse to be taken hostage by the weapons of politicians in the face of inequality, racism and oppression, but march together towards a clear and unambiguous goal.
-Anne Montgomery, RSCJ UN Disarmament Conference, 2002