Family in row with NLC over Sh1bn pay for Ruto office land

A Nakuru-based family and the National Land Commission (NLC) are locked in a row over blocked payment of Sh1 billion for land adjacent to Deputy President William Ruto’s Harambee House Annex office.

The commission has been criticised for stopping payment for the 0.7-acre prime plot, months after declaring the matriarch of the family, the late Rahab Wanjiru Evans, as the valid holder of the title deed following complaints that the land was public property and allocated irregularly.

The commission stopped payment after receiving a notice from a former MP indicating that the land was irregularly transferred from City Hall to Ms Wanjiru — a traditional dancer who entertained founding president Mzee Jomo Kenyatta. She was also the Nakuru Kanu Women Wing Leader.

“The politician is just another play-game. Which are these new facts that NLC had not exhausted before declaring the family were the owners of the land?” said a member of the family who did not want to be named.

“If there was any complaint, then it should have been raised long ago after the commission declared it would pay us. We have been waiting for years. Why would someone bring up an issue just a week after the plan to pay us was made public?”

The land commission gazetted the open space behind the DP’s office in Nairobi for compulsory acquisition in June 2015 on security grounds.

The State has already fenced it and paid Sh21 million to Ms Wanjiru’s estate for lost earnings given that it was previously used as a car park.

“We have an appeal over the land and we cannot pay until we review the complaint,” NLC acting chairperson Abigael Mbagaya told the Business Daily earlier.

“We will review whether the transfer from City Hall was irregular.”

The Treasury had allocated Sh500 million in the budget for the year ended June for the purchase of the 0.7-acre plot, and a balance of Sh500 million was to be allocated in the current financial year, pushing the buyout deal to Sh1 billion.

The late Wanjiru’s family said they bought the land in 1991 for Sh19 million through a loan from KCB Bank #ticker:KCB, arguing that City Hall had put the land for sale to clear debts.

Ms Wanjiru, who died in 2000, was a former freedom fighter and a member of the Nyakinyua Group, which was famous for entertaining the late Kenyatta.

She also served as Nakuru District Kanu Women Wing Leader during former president Daniel arap Moi’s era in the 1980s, underlying her proximity to power from the 1970s.