Land rows rock Kiambu as Governor Waititu runs roughshod over residents

On the night of January 12, 2019, Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu allegedly raided a piece of land at Kamae in Lari in the company of county askaris and destroyed the fence on grounds that it was public land.

Ms Esther Wangui, the owner of the 2.05 hectare piece of land, however, accused the governor of encroaching on her land by destroying the fence and crops.

She maintained that her son bought the land in 1992 and was issued with a green card and title deed by the Ministry of Lands, and since then there has been no dispute

Ms Wangui and her son have accused the county of attempting to grab their land with a view to dishing it out to “squatters”.

But when contacted on Saturday, Mr Waititu in a text message, without expounding, said that the land together with others, which his administration is being accused of grabbing, belongs to the public.

Waititu’s administration has been on the spot over alleged encroachment on private properties and those belonging to other public institutions and forcibly turning them into community land.

Already, the administration has five pending cases in Limuru and Thika while others are under investigations.

In one of the incidents, six surveyors attached to the county government and five workers were last week arraigned in a Limuru court after they were found demarcating land belonging to Kinyua Gitonga's at Kamae village in Lari.

Ms Ruth Nduta, Ladona Kulei, David Kariuki, Robert Muturi, Henry Karanja, Joshua Munene, Vincent Kipchisir, Gabriel Acholla, Yusuf Isaac, Kennedy Gikere and Antony Mbai denied charges of trespassing before Senior Resident Magistrate Sandra Ogot.

The accused, who were each released on a Sh100,000 and a surety of the same amount or Sh60,000 cash bail, were also charged with cutting 300 trees on the farm and destroying its fence.

The accused are said to have been led by a member of the county executive committee who is said to have escaped police arrest.

In the same court, Mr Robert Njoroge and Milton Njoroge from Lari have sued the county government for encroaching on their land, Escarpment/Kinale block 1/1724, at Gathwariga village in Kinale, measuring 2.7 acres, which is now being converted into an open-air market.

The Njoroges, in court documents, have said they acquired the property in 1992 from one Mary Wambui. They added that Mr Waititu held an impromptu meeting on the land few weeks ago and promised residents that he would build them a marketplace.

BABA YAO ROAD

Mr George Muiru Njoroge, also from Lari, has also filed a police report after county officers invaded his land Escarpment/Kinari Block 1/1685 and cut down trees, purporting that the land he is occupying is public. In another suit, Postal Corporation and a businessman have sued the county for invading Sh100 million worth piece of land- Kiambu Municipality/block 2/284 in Kiambu Town, which belongs to the parastatal and converting it to a bus park.

Posta has signed a 10-year lease with Fave Oil Limited, which is owned by Mr James Mungai, who by the time the land was invaded, was in the process of putting up a petrol station after obtaining necessary approvals even from the county government.

In July last year, the court issued another order, this time directing the county to remove the matatu operators from the suit land until the matter, which is still pending in court, is heard and determined but the directive was ignored.

Last month Mr Waititu invaded 1.9 hectares of land belonging to Posta in Makongeni Thika, which had already leased to a businessman and converted into a bus park, forcing the parastatal to file a suit at the Environment and Land Court (ELC) in Milimani, Nairobi before it was referred back to Thika.

In yet another case pending in Thika, Mr Duncan Macharia and Mr Michael Njiri have sued Mr Waititu and former Thika Town Member of Parliament Alice Ng'ang'a, that in 2016 they encroached on their land in Thika and converted it to public road. The two accused Mr Waititu and Ms N'gan'ga, who were then Jubilee Party candidates, of trespass and invasion on the property — Thika Municipality Block 10/718 and Thika Municipality Block 10/719 — and causing malicious damage following excavations, uprooting trees and destruction of crops.

Lady Justice Gacheru issued orders supporting the invasion claim, which was ignored and when Mr Waititu took office, he went ahead to tarmac it and named it “Baba Yao Road” despite the matter still pending in court.