By Amos Kareithi
After more than 78 years of waiting for a historical wrong to be righted, a clan that was banished by the colonial government and branded witch doctors has finally secured a place to call home.
However, it was a case of waiting for too little too long as only a section of the Talai community has been granted small pieces of land within Kericho municipality, where they have been squatting since they returned in the 1960s from the communal exile imposed by the colonial government.
The clan members were allocated residential plots measuring 50 by 100 feet in Kericho on a 75 acre piece of land after the Standard Group persistently highlighted their plight.
On Tuesday, leaders of the Talai community paid a courtesy call to the Standard Group’s Deputy Chairman and Chief Strategist Paul Melly where they expressed gratitude to the media house for exposing their plight.
“We are grateful to the Standard Group for highlighting our problems and the Government for allocating our members some plots. However, the clan’s problem have not been resolved as we have been victims of a historical injustice,” explained Mr Joseph Sigilai, the clan leader.
deported
He said in 1934, the entire clan, whose members were residing in Kericho and Nandi, were deported to Gwasi, which was infested with malaria and sleeping sickness and their land appropriated by the colonialists.
Mr Melly said the injustice occasioned on the Talai could never be forgotten, terming it a colonial plot to exterminate an entire population.
“There are many communities whose members were exposed to a lot of suffering by the colonialists and have never been compensated. It is time those who carried out the injustices are made to account. The Talai deserve to be compensated for the lost land,” said Melly.
