The truth behind Mau protest: Raila

• Big Mau landowners are trying to delay the restoration in cahoots with other forces who have historically opposed land reform, says embattled PM

Prime Minister Raila Odinga on Friday hit back at politicians opposed to the speedy restoration of the Mau, saying many of them had benefited from forest land.

The PM accused people he described as ‘‘rich landowners’’ of exploiting the poor to protect their own acquisitions in the water catchment area and asked them to vacate like other squatters.

In an opinion article elsewhere in this edition, Mr Odinga accuses his opponents of resorting to overt ethnic mobilisation, incitement and using “incendiary and mendacious demagoguery” to subvert Mau conservation efforts.

He says their actions were driven by their need to enhance their narrow political ambitions, which “has no place in our nation.”

“I have personally never seen a group of Kenyan politicians so desperately trying to build their leadership and hang on to their illicit landholdings through such grossly parochial and divisive campaigns,” the PM says.

He accuses some well-to-do leaders masquerading as the people’s champions of trying to prolong their suffering, as well as their own region’s environmental degradation.

And speaking in Kenyenya District, he declared that he would not relent in the struggle to save the Mau Forest despite criticism from a section of his colleagues.

Storm in sea

Mr Odinga said that the current political wave that has hit him concerning the Mau would not shake him.

“I cannot be shaken by anybody in my efforts to conserve the water catchment area. That is like a storm in the sea and it will soon calm down,” he added.

He was referring to the recent criticism from some Rift Valley MPs who are opposed to eviction of the illegal settlers.

The PM was speaking at Etono village during the burial of Sharon Osebe Anyieni, a daughter of former Bomachoge MP, Zephaniah Mogunde Anyieni.

Both the Ndung’u and Mau commission reports name some of the MPs who organised Thursday’s harambee for people leaving the Mau as some of the beneficiaries of the allocations.

Kuresoi MP Zachayo Kipkemoi Cheruiyot, who is among former powerful operatives in the Moi government named by the Mau Forest taskforce as among the beneficiaries of the resource, was the host of the harambee at Pan Afric Hotel in Nairobi.

Another organiser was Baringo Central MP Sammy Mwaita, who was Commissioner of Lands during the Mau allocations and is said to own huge chunks of land in the country’s largest water tower.