Nandi Hills MP to bar renewal of land leases for tea firms

An MP has vowed to push for tea estates leased to European settlers to revert to local communities once their leases expire.

Speaking at Chereber, Nandi Hills MP Alfred Keter said most leases of large-scale tea farms are about to lapse and land should therefore revert to the Government for fresh allocation.

"Members of Nandi community were evicted from their ancestral land, currently occupied by multinational tea companies, but as long as I am still the Nandi Hills MP, I will ensure land reverts to the community," he said.

The lawmaker said he had already presented a petition in Parliament seeking to block renewal of leases for huge tracts of agricultural land owned by multi-national tea companies, where the local communities were forcibly relocated during the colonial era.

Multi-national tea companies in the area had expected the leases to be renewed for another 99 years, but the MP said locals lost fertile land during British colonial rule and it was time to get it back.

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The leases were to run for 999 years, but that was reduced to 99 years upon promulgation of the Constitution in 2010. "It is unfair for the host communities while their ancestral land... is occupied by Europeans," he added.