More than 4,000 residents of Kondoo Farm in Burnt Forest, Uasin Gishu county, held protests on Monday against plans to evict them from their land.
The residents led by Bishop Paul Gathuo and Simon Bungei said they were shocked after a private holdings company served them with a three-month notice to vacate their homes failing which they would be forcefully evicted.
Gathuo and Bungei said they had since independence lived on the Kondoo Farm 3, which is registered as LR 10394.
They said residents residing on the expansive parcel of land were issued with title deeds during the late President Daniel Moi's reign.
“We were surprised to see a newspaper notice asking us to vacate from the land yet we have never had a dispute over it’s ownership,” Bishop Gathuo said.
The more than 575 acres of land near Burnt Forest town is currently occupied by the families who have since carried out varied developments.
The placard-waving residents held protests on the farm whillst displaying their titles as proof of ownership of the land.
Gathuo said the vacate notice was published in national newspapers on December 3 this year.
“As per the notice, we are required to stop any developments on the land and vacate within the next three months failing which we will be evicted but we want to make it clear that we will not move even an inch,” Gathuo said.
A copy of the notice seen by the Star asks the occupants to vacate the land, whose lawful proprietor is cited as a private company.
“Your occupation is thereof without express of lawful authority and without any right or license under any law,” the notice reads in part.
The residents, who the notice accuses of illegally occupying the land, have even been asked to immediately stop all activities on it, remove all erected buildings, crops and trees and vacate within three months.
The notice was signed by lawyers actig on behalf of the private company laying claim to the land.
Gathuo and Bungei asked President William Ruto to intervene and stop their eviction from the land valued at over Sh1billion.
“We did not have any problems during the regimes of all the former presidents and we wonder why people should emerge to frustrate us now,” Bungei said.
He said the President should not allow them to be evicted from the land, which they own legally.
“We have been left wondering if the government that gave us the titles is fake because what we know we have genuine titles which must be respected,” Gathuo said.
Bungei said any move by those laying claim to the land would be resisted by the families.
“It’s on this land where we have buried all our ancestors and no one can emerge now to claim its ownership. We will defend it at all costs,” Bungei said.
The protesters insisted that their grand parents had lived on the land where they were squatters originally before it was allocated to them by the late President Jomo Kenyatta.
Other representatives including Lucy Too and youth leader, Elijah Kemboi, said the eviction notice had caused panic and fear among them.
“Some of our parents who are aged have been exposed to frustration and depression after being told of the possibility of eviction,” Bungei said.
Bungei and Gathuo vowed to ensure there would be no encroachment on the land.
