Integrated Internally Displaced Persons plea to the government

Nyandarua

Thursday, July 27, 2023

KNA by Antony Mwangi

Integrated Internally Displaced Persons from Nyandarua who settled in Kianjogu village, Salama ward in Laikipia County have appealed to the government to resettle them.

Speaking in the area, the integrated IDPs questioned the government's delay in issuing them with land and money as it had promised. Most of the integrated IDPs in the camp missed out on the land during the initial phases of settling the IDPs.

In 2017, the government issued them Sh 50,000 each and promised to issue them with the remaining Sh 150,000 last year, a pledge that is yet to be honored. The camp hosts over 3,600 persons with the majority of them being elderly women and children.

The integrated IDPs coordinator, James Mwaura, said that they are suspecting that some powerful individuals are behind their suffering. He alleged that the individuals want to skew the settlement process so that they can end up sharing the IDPs’ land amongst themselves.

“This is the best time the government should resettle integrated IDPS. Most of the people here missed out on the other phases of those who were given land.

“Our president in 2017 when he was the Deputy President promised to settle us with land here in Salama ward. The land is here but we are being denied to settle on the land. The land is lying idle despite having written hundreds of letters to the county governments and the senate over this issue,” said Mwaura

The camp is made of polyethylene shanties and lacks basic amenities like toilets and access to clean water. The area is also heavily infested by snakes, elephants and hyenas.

Most of the IDPs in the camp are casual laborers now in the neighboring villages where some are paid with foodstuffs in exchange to tilling farms in the area .

Recently, pastoralists have driven their camels in the area, thus creating some tension between the pastoral community and the IDPs.

Courtesy ; K. N. A