Lamu port project halted in land row

The government has been told to stop any further construction of the Lamu port until a petition filed by aggrieved land owners is heard and determined.

Six people had filed a petition seeking to suspend the project. Mr Justice Oscar Angote, sitting in Malindi, Thursday issued an injunction against further development of the Lamu Port Southern Sudan-Ethiopia Transport (Lapsset) project.

Justice Angote restrained the Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development and the Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) from commencing any construction, dredging, working on the land or any Lamu port-related works or interfering with the petitioners’ occupation of their land until the case is determined.

He also stopped Lands Cabinet Secretary Charity Ngilu, ministry agents and employees from conducting any survey, demarcation and issuance of title deeds or interfering with the petitioners’ land.

Mr Omar Jelani, Mr Kassim Ali, Mr Shumi Bamku, Mr Khauru Omar, Mr Swaleh Mohammed and Mr Mahamad Rajab have also sued the Attorney General, Lapsset Corridor Development Authority (LCDA) and the National Lands Commission.

MODE OF RESETTLING

The six claim that they own land where part of the project is to be initiated. They are seeking information on the mode of resettling and compensating those who will be displaced.

Mr Jelani and Mr Ali said they were occupiers of land on which the Lamu port offices are located while the other petitioners said they owned and occupied land located on the Mokowe-Lamu port road, which leads to the port.

Through lawyer George Wakahiu, the six said their petition followed an advert in a local daily on September 7 in which Mrs Ngilu was to visit Kililana — where the port offices are located — to start the process of establishing who the genuine beneficiaries of the project are to issue title deeds to them before being compensated.

They said the Cabinet Secretary visited Kililana the following day with her team of surveyors and started establishing who the genuine owners were without consulting the residents and that together with other government agencies forcefully entered the site and lodged claim of their land.

Afterwards, consultants from KPA were sent to determine how much those affected were entitled to and recommended that they be compensated Sh1.5 million per acre. Some 146 farmers who had been occupying the land were identified as the genuine beneficiaries.

Mr Wakahiu said the beneficiaries were consequently asked to provide details of their bank accounts and signed agreements with KPA lawyers who were in charge of implementing the project with a promise that the funds would be deposited soon.

But the petitioners are apprehensive that the CS may come up with a different list of beneficiaries since she did not state how the government intended to resettle the displaced land owners.
The case will be heard on December 8.