Mwea Residents call for committee to sort out land issues

Embu,

Saturday, January 20,2024

KNA by Steve Gatheru

Residents of four settlement schemes in Mwea, Embu county, want the government to form a 20-person committee that will sort out problems that have bedevilled families in the area.

They said many families that have lived in the Wacoro, Karaba, Riakanau and Makima adjudication areas all their lives have been living in a state of fear after strangers started appearing with land ownership documents seeking to evict them.

They said the land problems in the four schemes are getting more complex as the population grows and added that it was time the government found a way in which those living on the land without documents and those with documents but no physical presence on the ground can all be accommodated to end conflicts.

The residents, who held a meeting at Gitaaraka shopping center Friday said the government unsuccessfully tried to facilitate the subdivision and allotment of plots in 1968/9 and again in 1978 but both attempts failed to be conclusive because many families actually living on the land were left out as outsiders were given allotment letters without being shown actual plots on the ground.

The residents are now recommending that a 20-person committee comprising five people from each scheme be formed to identify genuine people who need to be in the schemes after looking at physical homes and scrutinizing documents.

Mr Patrick Mwangangi said they have been living uncertain life, with strangers popping up with eviction orders to tell them to move from the land they have called home all their lives.

"Sometimes we cannot even bury our dead because someone comes with a court order just when we want to dig the grave", Mwangangi added.

The Chairman of the Embu Council of Elders Andrew Ireri Njeru said the problems in the four schemes was complex as some plots have three to four claimants.

Ms Monica Ndanu said a previously unknown owner last year came with policemen and a gang who demolished ten houses belonging to her family.

Ms Rose Njoki Kiarago who said her family moved from Kithimu in the current Embu West Subcounty after the 1978 allotments said they live in fear that they may be evicted any time.

"We cannot even develop because we do not know what tomorrow will be like," she said.

57-year old Moses Muasya said they were evicted and their houses burnt in 1978 when a new allottee laid claim to where their home lay and they moved to a different location.

He said they would want the matter resolved amicably because he wouldn't want their grandchildren to go through what they went through when he was 11 years old.

Courtesy; KNA