This was a chilling week. The devil visited this country from the seas like a thunderbolt and rained a series of disaster in form of Sinai, Yukozuna, road carnage, and collapsed buildings. It is the season when, as they say, the gods were upset – hence black September. It was also the week when the state silently made yet another desperate attempt to resettle some 265 IDPs from Nakuru to the fertile lands of lower Subukia, in particular LR No. 6507, Nakuru.
This development would justifiably call for cheers, champagne and chants of “hallelujah!” until you learn that the 750 acre parcel is in dispute – again! Shareholders, according to press reports, say they were not consulted as the estate administrator clandestinely sold family silver in the guise of unproductivity.
The claimants to the fortune are eight daughters of the late Benjamin Njoroge. They have a portion of 238 acres which they claim was fraudulently sold for a song – Shs. 102, 000 per acre. Here land goes for 0.5 Million per acre. Then, there are over 300 squatters in the same land who are demanding a pie having lived and worked on the farm for decades. The matter is moving to the courts.
Forgery
Moses Akaranga, Director of Settlement, adamantly insists –it’s a done deal. The daughters maintain its fraud, forgery and criminal period!
This is the latest fiasco that is visiting the IDP resettlement effort which seems to have been jinxed and turned into a circus, cash cow and object of political profiteering. But this latest round of embarrassment could have easily been avoided if only someone at the ministry of lands would have done a little homework before rushing to town with “we have a deal.”
This debacle is not new and only affirms the sickly nature of the official structure, naivety and intellectual want of those charged with the resettlement exercise. Of course this is not the first time the lands and special programmes have been shamelessly exposed. They were embarrassed in Endebes, Trans-nzoia and Narok. Yet, there are no lessons learnt lending credence to the suspicion that the quagmire created could also mean that public officers as much as politicians have ingeniously turned the IDP tragedy to be the legendary goose with golden eggs.
Indeed, in the current budget, Uhuru Kenyatta set aside a cool Ksh. 4.2 billion for resettlement of IDPs. Part of the money was meant for Ministry of Lands to buy land while Ministry of Special Programmes for extra gratia expenses.
Private Property
Akaranga who is permanently perched in Nairobi issuing threats is losing a point. You cannot force a legitimate property owner to dispose off property – at least the constitution protects private property.
Yet with people like Akaranga and Esther Murugi masquerading like the captains, this country is light years away from social and economic revolution. The duo should honorably quit to pave way for honest and productive actors.
For this exercise to succeed, the mandarins at the ministry of lands and special programmes must be replaced with sober and committed technocrats who can quickly craft solution, negotiate and resettle the IDPs.
Indeed, it is downright foolhardy to engage in such casual transactions without making an effort to scratch the surface and find out what is down there. It is the embodiment of idiocy to write cheques to ghost beneficiaries you have never seen.
I can’t stop admiring the late Njoroge for having been a progressive minded old man. Even at a time when it was a taboo almost criminal to imagine that daughters could inherit a piece of property, the old man was far ahead of his time to bequeath his daughters with 16.5 acres each. His sons got a lion’s share of at least 200 acres each. Interestingly, this has not deterred the sons to defraud their sisters. What a soap!
Anyway, this is domestic affairs.
How come the government entered into a land deal as if it was buying sukuma wiki from mama mboga? According to press reports, the Njoroge daughters were shocked to learn that their father’s inheritance was being sold. They claim to have sort assistance from the area DC but to no success nor could they get any assistance from the PC. Perhaps the courts will come to their rescue.
Chauvinism
One can easily read the chauvinistic traits of the brothers wanting to grab even the little that their sisters were offered. And the matter rekindles the ever emotive debate on inheritance – well a topic for another day.
But who sanctioned the sale? Did someone forged signatures of other beneficiaries including that of the late Owen Ndung’u one of the brothers? Did the dealers made effort to know that in 1997 the high court legalized the late Njoroge’s Will and that subsequently a surveyor was on site, land mapped and beacons erected? If the answer to this is yes, why the impunity and arrogance? If no, who misled the state? Who slept on the job?
Enough said. There seem to be massive self-interest, corruption, indolence and recklessness on the part of the state. Over to you Madame Murugi.
Wamanji is a communications consultant ewamanji@yahoo.co.uk>