Anxiety as Nema announces demolition plan in Nyahururu

NYAHURURU, KENYA: Anxiety has gripped plot owners at the posh Manguo estate in Nyahururu town after the National Environmental and Management Authority (NEMA) issued a thirty days ultimatum for those who have built on River Uaso Narok riparian land to demolish them.

The owners are set to lose property worth millions of shillings as over 100 houses are set to be demolished.

On Friday, NEMA officials drawn from Laikipia and Nyeri counties toured the area where they marked the houses set to be demolished.

The officials also earmarked houses and petrol stations polluting water and with poor drainage systems most of them which were closed down.

During the operation led by Laikipia NEMA director Fanuel Musoga, several plot owners whose houses had no septic tanks and linked to environment pollution were arrested.

“We have given all those who have encroached on the riparian land to either demolish them or we do it ourselves at their own expense. No one should construct a house beyond the thirty meters limit as per the law,” said Musoga.

He noted that this was in the authority’s effort to conserve degradation of Uaso Narok River which supplies water to Nyahururu town and also the famous Thompson falls.

“We cannot sit and watch as the river is being polluted by some few individuals. All the landlords must comply with the law so as to bring sanity to this sector,” he said.

Musoga said that the crackdown was being conducted all over the two counties so that the issue of environmental pollution was dealt with finally.