Murang’a based housing cooperative in the spotlight over land auction

Murang’a,

Wednesday, November 8, 2023

KNA by Purity Mugo

Members of a housing co-operative society in Murang’a are in distress following the continued delay in the issuance of title deeds for parcels of land they purchased five years ago. 

The members who purchased land under a project dubbed Bahamas stormed the Broad Borders Co-operative Society offices in Murang’a after learning that the society had secured a bank loan using their land and failed to pay.

Led by Mr. John Ndirangu Nyorotha, Ms. Mary Wambui and Mr. Ibrahim Ndungo the aggrieved investors gave the management two weeks to clear the loan with the bank and start the process of subdividing the land failure to which they will take stern action.  

They stormed the offices demanding an explanation after learning that a commercial bank had engaged an auctioneer firm to sell off the property in order to recover Sh14.5 million that the cooperative had borrowed.

“We demand to know why the cooperative used our land as security for a loan without consulting members,” Nyorotha said.

“We also want to know why they did not communicate to us until now when auctioneers are about to sell the land,” he added.

Only five out of the 43 members had not completed making payment for the project that is located in the Kagio area of Kirinyaga county.

“We want the society to note that the members of Bahamas project held a meeting on November 2 and that they demand that the society finalizes repaying the Sh14.5 million bank loan and start processing our title deeds within the next two weeks,” Nyorotha said.

Wambui said the members who have parted with approximately Sh.1million each are anxious over the state of their investment saying that there have been reported incidents where other investors have been duped by the same society.

“We have heard of projects in Naromoru in Nyeri county, where the members were evicted by people claiming to be the owners of the land they had bought through Broad borders,” Wambui said.

“We started investing in his project in 2018 and most of us have paid in full so now we want title deeds,” she added. 

Addressing the concerns of the angry protestors, the treasurer to the society Francis Matigi who was accompanied by the operations manager Mr. Munune sympathized with the members saying they were working towards correcting the situation.

The two, however, could not explain if the bank was seeking the repayment of Sh4.5 million or Sh14.5 million from the project.

Mr. Matigi was lost for words when asked to explain how the leadership used the project’s title deed to acquire the bank loan, without communicating to the members.

“We had planned to convene a meeting for the members as we worked towards stopping the bank from selling off the property,” Matigi said urging the members to be a little patient as they resolved the matter. 

The bank, he said, had agreed to stop the auction on condition that the loans are fully repaid by December 31 2023. 

Courtesy; KNA