Governor Johnson Sakaja wants Langa'ta Cemetery spruced up to ensure the dead have a beautiful resting place. The City boss has deployed a team to routinely clean the colonial-era graveyard.
On January 22, the environment unit embarked on cleaning overgrown bushes, weeding, picking litter, mowing, and leveling uneven patches at the public cemetery.
"I issued a directive to the environment team to clear and make the cemetery tidy. We must ensure that we provide dignity to all including the departed," read a statement from the governor's office. According to Sakaja, the team is working hard to give a facelift to the cemetery. This is the first time a special unit has been formed to ensure the graveyard is neat.
The 100-acre cemetery was declared full about a decade ago, but bodies continue to arrive every day for burial. The cemetery is divided between a permanent and temporary section. Space at the permanent graves for adults costs Sh30,000, children Sh4,000 while that for infants is Sh2,000.
Those from outside Nairobi are charged Sh40,000. In 2009, City Hall lost millions of shillings after the defunct City Council of Nairobi paid Sh283 million for 48.5 acres in Mavoko, Machakos County.
The land earmarked as an alternative to Langata Cemetery had been valued at Sh24 million.
Following the scandal, a senior land official and then city council staff were jailed for their role in the Sh283 million cemetery land swoop and were sentenced to three years in jail and fined Sh1 million each after being found guilty of abuse of office.
