Give Tsavo National Park to Taita-Taveta County Government, Coast MPs demand

Calls to have Tsavo National Park handed to the county government intensified yesterday, with several MPs joining in the call.

Governor Granton Samboja has been spearheading efforts to have the Government surrender the park.

Mr Samboja said residents were not benefiting from the resource. Likoni MP Mishi Mboko claimed Tsavo East and Tsavo West national parks were illegally allocated to Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) and that locals were kept out of the decision.

The ODM legislator said the vast wildlife ecosystem should now be reverted to the local community to manage and conserve it.

“The wildlife resource is not benefiting communities hosting and conserving it. It is absurd that residents are living in abject poverty because nothing from the park is being ploughed back to the community,” Ms Mboko said yesterday.

Mombasa Senator Mohamed Faki noted that while the county had such a large wildlife ecosystem, there was nothing to show for it in terms of development.

"We want to see residents benefit from the resource like their counterparts in Narok County, who have been enjoying fruits of the Masai Mara Game Reserve,” Faki said.

Area Senator Jones Mwaruma said: "We want to take over the Tsavo ecosystem for the benefit of residents who have been living in poverty line despite owning the resource that has been is benefiting outsiders."

Senators Ledama Olekina (Narok) and Charles Kibiru (Kirinyaga) said it would only be fair for the county to get its fair share of the revenue from the Tsavo.

The legislators' remarks came after the county administration initiated a petition to have the national government hand over the park to the county.

Samboja said he was working with local leaders to collect signatures from residents, to be used in pushing the national government to surrender the park.

"Our efforts to come up with a petition on the matter are on course. Residents are appending their signatures as we demand that the parks should be handed back to us," Samboja said.

It is estimated that KWS had been collecting more than Sh3 billion from the parks annually.