Family given nearly all Maasai Forest

Members of a powerful family in Maasai amassed chunks of land, virtually owning the entire Maasai Mau Trust Land Forest in Narok.

Documents in our possession show that seven members of the ole Ntutu family of late ex-senior chief Lerionka ole Ntutu, including his son, former assistant minister Stephen ole Ntutu, irregularly acquired large parcels of land in various names.

Some of them sold their pieces at huge sums of money running into millions of shillings, at some point. The original sizes of most of the land was hugely inflated before being sold.

One such stretch of land is the Nkaroni Group Ranch registered in the names of the former minister, his brothers and sisters. Other cases of massive encroachment into the forest involved, Enaisomi, Sisami, Ngobeni, Neiyo, and Nkareta ranches and farms.

Some 70.03 hectares of the Nkaroni land registered in 1999 by the family members was later in 2002 issued as a “gift” to a Mr Kipruto Arap Ngeno, only to be transferred back to a member of the Ntutu family — a Mr Looyieyio ole Ntutu — two years later.

The June 2004 report of the Commission of Inquiry into the illegal and irregular allocations of public land notes that sizes of most of the group ranches allocated were inflated hugely and the difference sold to unsuspecting settlers.

It cites the Nkaroni Group Ranch that registered the initial size as 1,597.5 hectares and whose current size is estimate at approximately 9,000 hectares.
Others include the Enaikishomi Group Ranch and the Sisiyian Farm.

The latter, owned by a former chief, ole Sankei was inflated from 300 hectares to approximately 2,700 hectares, while the former, was inflated from an initial size of 844.5 hectares to an estimated 9,000 hectares.

According to the Ndung’u Commission of Inquiry report, Enaikishomi Group Ranch is one of the ranches that were used by officers in the then Ministry of Lands and Settlement to encroach into the Maasai Trust Land Forest. The report notes that a big area of the forest was de-registered and allocated to several individuals by the ministry illegally.

Still at the Nkaroni Group Ranch in the Mara Ololulunga area, 1,364.70 hectares of land registered in Mr Livingstone Ntutu’s names — a brother to the former assistant minister — was sold to Ilgina Contractors Limited for a sum of Sh13 million at the rate of Sh20,000 per acre and the land sub-divided.

A sale agreement in our possession indicates that the instalments for the sum were paid in the name of Mr Livingstone ole Ntuntu as the agent for the ranch.
The same was certified by the Narok District land registrar in July 2005.

Interestingly, however, Ilgina Contractors Limited purportedly registered in Kisii, was a Ntutu family company. The Registrar of Companies in a letter to lawyers S. Musalia Mwenesi in December 2005, confirms that the records as at that date indicated the directors and shareholders of Ilngina Contractors Limited were Ms Agnes Naropil Ntutu, Kiteleiki Ntutu and Kunini Ntutu, with shares of 490,490 and 20 respectively.

Ironically, it is the Ntutu Presidential Commission set up in 1986 that was to establish the boundaries of the Maasai Mau Forest. The commission’s report was to be used as authentic reference for forest boundaries and in establishing cutoff lines for evictions.