More than 100 squatters evicted from Kitalale settlement schemes in Saboti, Trans Nzoia county seek reparations.
The squatters have asked the Kenya Kwanza government to consider reparations to most families whose parents died without being settled.
Through their representative Stephen Nyapara, they said they face difficulties and need a place to call home.
Nyapara on Thursday said in 1987 about 5,000 squatters evicted from Kiboroa forest were offered land at the Kitalale settlement scheme by the then president Daniel Moi.
He said the evictees were camping at Kisawai, Gituamba, Machewa and Saboti trading centres.
He said it was a relief for them to have been given the land by Moi.
Nyapara however, said the 168 acres they are laying claim to, is being held by an influential tycoon.
He said they have not been settled since the department of Lands said an alternative land was being sought.
They asked President William Ruto to fulfill his campaign promise and buy an alternative land and settle them.
"The President promised to set aside some funds to buy land for squatters. It is time he reciprocates for the votes we gave him,” Nyapara said.
The squatters said their only salvation lies in the hands of the President after their plea for settlement fell on deaf ears.
They said successive regimes abandoned them.
"Many squatters have given up in life and even developed depression," Nyapara said.
He said one of the elders who had been pushing for the settlement of the remaining 100 squatters lost his sight, others lost their lives, while some remain beggars.
"Mzee Paul Kiboi who has gone blind is among the few that are still hopeful that one day he will be settled," Nyapara said.
The squatters appealed to the new Director of Criminal Investigations to establish how the influential tycoons and other top government officials took over the land at the settlement scheme leaving them hopeless.
The squatters mainly from the Sabaot community said those laying claim on the land were ferried from a neighbouring county and should be forced to compensate their families.
"This land we are laying claim to is our real home and we have nowhere else to go despite having been evicted. We are asking the government to be merciful to us," Nyapara said.
Like Nyapara, Absolom Simotwo, 70, also lives in a rental house in Birunda market.
Nyapara, Simotwo and Kiboi had in the year 2000 sued the then Rift Valley provincial director of settlement and three other individuals.
They said they were lawful allotted titles of the 168 acres of land at the Kitalale settlement scheme.
For one reason or another, the case was not concluded until 2016 when a consent was recorded compromising the suit by its withdrawal.
It was however, on condition that the respondents were resettled in Trans Nzoia county within one year from the date of the adoption of the consent.
The squatters now say that despite all that nothing has been done.
They are now asking President William Ruto to settle them in the new year to allow them to live like any other Kenyan, enjoying fundamental rights to decent living in their own land.
A woman rights crusader Dorothy Cherop Mikisi said women and children have suffered immensely.
She said the surviving women and their children are the most vulnerable.
Mikisi said the government should move with speed and settle the remaining families.
"When you are poor and vulnerable there must be someone to give you a shoulder to lean on," she said.
Mikisi at one time appeared before the Truth and Justice Commission that was investigating land injustices in Trans Nzoia.
She said the squatters were unfairly evicted from their land and do not know why the process of resettlement or reparation has taken too long.
"We are still wondering why they were evicted from the land that they had occupied for such a long time. It was a wrong move and proper investigations must be done concerning the issue," Mikisi said.
The activist said despite the department of lands and settlement promising to get funds to settle them, nothing had been achieved.
"What happened with the allotment letters given to the squatters on the 168 acres of land? Government officers including former Lands and settlement minister Amos Kimunya must be held responsible," she said.
Saboti MP Caleb Amisi said the government has a responsibility to settle the squatters and other landless people.
The MP had tabled a motion in Parliament to have the squatters given an alternative settlement.
The second term ODM legislator said he cannot sit back and watch his constituents suffer.
He asked the government to move with speed and determine the rightful owners of the land.