Senators take on National Land Commission over Ksh.70B compensation owed to Kenyans

It is now emerging that the National Land Commission (NLC) has not compensated Kenyans whose land was acquired by the government to a tune of Ksh.70 billion.

This as the commission’s officials failed to appear before the Senate Roads, Transportation and Housing Committee to explain the delays, and have now been summoned to appear on Thursday.

According to the committee chair Karungo Thang'wa, NLC is yet to compensate residents of the 1.4km Mombasa gate bridge project that is to be constructed by the Japanese government.

The project that is worth Ksh.120 billion has however stalled as the government is yet to honor its end of the bargain and compensate residents before it kicks off.

“What we need to do as a committee is to crack the whip.  We do not want to be seen to be losing hope. I’m summoning the chairman of NLC to appear before this committee on Thursday,” Thang’wa said.

NLC boss Gershom Otachi had written to the committee on Monday asking to appear at a later date as he had a scheduled event with Head of Public Service Felix Koskei.

“Giving any excuse to delay the appearance will be delaying justice to the people,” the Chairman stated.

The committee, apparently disappointed by Otachi’s no-show, took on the commission for sitting on billions of shillings meant to compensate Kenyans who surrendered their land and homes to allow for the implementation of State projects.

NLC is mandated to compensate project-affected persons upon confirmation of ownership of the parcels.

On Monday, Thang’wa and Kitui Senator Enoch Wambua said the commission has failed to pay the lot despite receiving funds from the project implementing agencies.

The Kibwezi-Mutomo-Kitui-Kabati-Migwani road project was launched by former President Uhuru Kenyatta in 2017 and yet the residents have not been compensated.

The project was undertaken by the Chinese firm, Sinohydro Corporation and was set to be completed in May 2022.

In yet another revelation, Thang’wa said that out of the Ksh.1.9 billion land owners in Kiambu are supposed to receive for their land used to construct the Western bypass, only about Ksh.600 million has been released by the commission.

This is the case with James Gichuru-Rironi Road where some Ksh.2.9 billion out of the total compensation amount of Ksh.10.09 billion is yet to be paid out.

“Why are they not paying the locals? Since the 2020-21 financial year, this money is still with NLC,” Thang’wa said.

 “It is a very frustrating thing. This money has been held by NLC for now more than two years going into three years. In which account does this money exist?” Wambua posed.

He added: “Who is benefiting from this interest? And if people are supposed to be compensated at market rate, the rates then are lower than today, will they consider that?”

“If a private citizen builds on government land, we send bulldozers to remove them from government land, so we cannot allow government to occupy private land. The government is trespassing, if they have not compensated the people of Kiambu, Kitui and Mombasa, they must be trespassing and we can’t wait anymore,” noted committee chair Thang’wa.