Opinion: Address irregular land allocations now

Land is the basis for many Kenyans' livelihoods and defines the core of asset ownership. However, the country faces major challenges related to land, including huge disparities in ownership and security of tenure, especially when it comes to community land.

But the biggest challenge affecting land in Kenya is the irregular allocation or acquisition of public land, commonly referred to as land grabbing. For instance, the media has in the recent past quoted cases of public land grabbed in counties such as Nairobi, Kiambu, Nyandarua, Narok and Lamu.

In December 2016, the Institute of Surveyors of Kenya (ISK) raised the red flag concerning increased land grabbing in the country. The build-up of illegally allocated public land began in 1979, when the Ministry of Lands and Settlement was abolished and placed as a department in the Office of the President.

Following this development, land began to be used to reward political loyalty.

Parcels owned by public institutions such as hospitals, schools, public slaughterhouses as well as Government houses were the main attractions in irregular allocations. In addition, forest land was excised and allocated to individuals who sold it to state corporations.

Other categories of public land affected by illegal allocations were settlement schemes earmarked for the poor, national parks, game reserves, road reserves and wetlands.

The struggle for land reforms has characterised Kenya’s history since colonial times. Indeed, the journey to political independence was initiated by the demand for land rights by Africans.

During the clamour for political reforms in Kenya in the 1990s, one of the prominent issues was reforms in land administration and management.

Further, land has increasingly become a source of conflict in Kenya, mainly due to population pressure, resource scarcity and speculation related to extractive industries and urbanisation.

In an attempt to get to the bottom of land problems in Kenya, the Government, in 2002, formed the Ndung'u Commission of Inquiry to look into the irregular allocation of public land.

It documented cases where public land had been illegally transferred to private individuals and corporate entities. Land ownership remains an important mark of identity and is therefore a driver of social and political realignment.

To choose to ignore or disregard land issues in Kenya will weaken the social fabric that meshes social harmony. Being the first post-2010 Constitution regime, the Jubilee government should address the challenges facing the land sector.

Although the Government has instituted the National Land Commission and initiated reforms on land information systems and documentation, illegal or irregular allocations are yet to be addressed.

These allocations have been a core component of the corruption problem in Kenya and addressing them would have a positive impact on macro-economic stability.

Fortunately, the Ndung'u Commission recommends a number of measures to be undertaken, key among them the revocation of illegal title deeds and the repossession of illegally acquired land. In practice, these recommendations may be too drastic and insensitive to the political realities of the day.

An alternative to revocation of illegal titles is to regularise ownership of illegally acquired land. This requires the enacting of appropriate legislation. What the current title holders of illegally acquired land have done is acquire ownership without paying the requisite consideration. This is an incomplete transaction and therefore illegal.

Market mechanisms assume that prices capture the value of the products or resources in question. To complete and, therefore, regularise possession of illegally acquired land, appropriate laws should be enacted to regularise transactions (in the sense that the Government is disposing of the same) with current market prices taken as a proxy to how the public values the land.

Therefore, the Executive arm of Government should initiate legislation that allows people with illegally acquired land to pay market rates for it in place of compulsive repossession.

This initiative may turn out to be an innovative approach to improving governance and integrity in land administration in Kenya.