Leaders demand meeting with Uhuru amid Mau clashes
Kericho Governor Paul Chepkwony. He wants Uhuru Kenyatta to address key issues South Rift residents are facing. PHOTO | FILE | NATION MEDIA GROUP
What you need to know:
- Chepkwony said that at the heart of the Mau dispute are historical land disputes, political incitement, fight for scarce resources and banditry.
- Most of the politicians we spoke to lamented that the president seemed to have turned his back on them after being re-elected in October last year.
Politicians from the South Rift are now pushing for a meeting with President Uhuru Kenyatta amid escalating crisis in the Mau region compounded by recent ethnic clashes in Njoro, Nakuru County.
Mr Kenyatta has already received a letter dated September 10 and signed by 19 leaders including Bomet Governor Joyce Laboso and her Kericho counterpart Paul Chepkwony.
“We, the elected leaders of Kericho and Bomet counties present our request for an appointment to meet with you to discuss variety of emerging issues affecting the community of the South Rift region,” they wrote.
Other undersigned are Kericho Senator Aaron Cheruiyot, Belgut MP Nelson Koech, Bomet Senator Christopher Langat, the speakers of the two counties with a copy sent to the Deputy President William Ruto.
EVICTIONS
The idea of the meeting was mooted during the youth empowerment graduation parade in Kericho presided by Governor Chepkwony and the letter crafted the same day.
At a time when the move to flush out illegal settlers in the Mau Forest faces resistance from the Kipsigis community, a meeting of this calibre is expected to be stormy.
Prof Chepkwony said that at the heart of the Mau dispute are historical land disputes, political incitement, fight for scarce resources and banditry.
There is also the talk of negligence by the national government. “The Kipsigis nation is not amused by how the national government has handled the whole matter. When we get to meet the president, we would also be raising some other issues like revenue sharing by the tea firms with the local community.
"We feel the region has never benefited from the fact it is their land these factories rely on for production,” Prof Chepkwony said.
PROMISES
Most of the politicians we spoke to lamented that the president seemed to have turned his back on them after being re-elected in October last year.
They say most of the campaign pledges remain unfulfilled. “We have never met him as a region after elections and the general feeling is that he has not come through for us,” Mr Koech.
He accused the authorities of double standards citing the case of Sogoo, one of the affected areas in Mau that was recently gazetted as a division by the same government that is now kicking people out.
“There is a school in Mau whose construction the president promised during the campaigns to come back and complete. Sadly, we the elected leaders have been barred from gaining entry there.
"There are irons sheets and foodstuff we bought with Senator Kipchumba Murkomen to take there but we were stopped. We don’t even know how the people there are coping,” the lawmaker from Belgut said.
The leaders will also be registering their reservations to Mr Kenyatta concerning two powerful government officers they accuse of favouring the Maasai Mau side in the resettlement programme.
