Maralal families oppose resettlement from cemetery land

Residents of Mtaro cemetery in Maralal Town have opposed the County Government of Samburu plan to resettle them to alternative places.

The residents argue that they legally acquired the land from the defunct County Council of Maralal.

They added that they had used the properties as collateral to secure bank facilities.

The affected families want the county government to compensate them before resettling them saying that the cost of construction was too high.

“That is a nice place and we want to continue staying there. We legally bought the plots without knowing that we were buying cemetery land,” said Ms Mary Waikwa, one of the affected residents.

The residents were speaking Wednesday, September 28 at the Maralal Chief’s camp after attending a consultative meeting organized by the county’s department of lands ahead of the planned resettlement.

The affected families are asking their leaders to intervene in order to save their property from being demolished without compensation.

“We urge our politicians not to abandon us because we did not share these plots among ourselves. We legally got allotment letters from the defunct town council, which is now the county government,” said Harman Loochum, another affected resident.

They are also proposing that the county government transfers the cemetery to Shabaa area arguing that their current place, Mtaro, is already occupied and very developed.

Samburu County Executive Committee Member in charge of Land, Irene Senei Leseeto, insisted that the affected families would not be compensated by the County Government for their houses.

She said the court has only agreed on resettlement adding that constitutionally there is no compensation on issues of public land.

“In fact, the court was very lenient to direct us to resettle the affected families in alternative places because they had been given plots by the authorities at that time,” she said.

There are about 50 families that will be resettled from the cemetery land.