Eviction hangs over 120,000 in Mombasa

Residents carry on with their daily activities at Waitiki Farm in Likoni, Mombasa County. The 930-acre farm stretches 100 metres from Likoni ferry landing and covers left side of the main Likoni-Kwale road. [PHOTO: OMONDI ONYANGO/STANDARD]

By Willis Oketch

MOMBASA, KENYA: A family has obtained a court order requiring the police to evict up to 120,000 squatters and their properties from land in Likoni, Mombasa County.

But police are not keen to enforce the order, saying it would raise tensions in a region where the issue of squatters evokes powerful emotions.

They say it could easily lead to violence as the land houses churches, schools, mosques and several prime businesses, including petrol stations.

It also has police stations. If enforced, the order could wipe out close to 50 per cent of the properties in the expansive Likoni area.

The land is said to be under Waitiki Farm and is a massive 930 acres (376 hectares), stretching 100 metres from the Likoni ferry landing and encompassing the left side of the main Likoni-Kwale road.

Southwards, it covers swathes of Timbwani and Shika Adabu wards in Likoni Constituency.

To demonstrate the scale of work and dangers involved in the event the order is enforced, Coast Provincial Police Officer (PPO) Mr Aggrey Adoli has sworn an affidavit declaring, “security personnel within coastal region will not be enough to handle the eviction and demolition.”

According to the affidavit sworn on August 15 Adoli predicts “disturbances thereafter” warning that religious and tribal violence as well as separatism will surely follow any enforcement of the pending orders.

“Demolition of places of worship in particular will ignite violence by devotees and may be wrongly interpreted as a means of targeting their religion,” he says.

Adoli pointed out that Likoni is prone to violence, especially during election cycles, and indigenous coastal squatters “who are the majority are likely to perceive that they are being targeted and displaced to pave way for the upcountry people to settle on their ancestral land.”

 

The owners say they will seek the arrest and prosecution of Police Commissioner Mr Mathew Iteere if he fails to cooperate on the matter.

Ownership

“Timbwani ward alone has 61,000 residents and Government estimates indicate that the disputed land has 16,000 housing units and 50,000 households,” said a civic leader who asked not to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter.

Today Justice Francis Tuiyot is expected to tour the farm to ascertain the status of the disputed land following a recent decision by Mr Evanson Jidraph Kamau Waitiki to enforce a November 8, 2001 court order that ruled in his favour with regard to ownership of the land.

On August 21 this year Waitiki applied through lawyer Mr Gibson Kamau Kuria to commit Iteere to civil jail for six months.

Iteere was to be charged for “disobeying a court order” on made on November 8, 2001 that was duly served on him and President Kibaki.

Without fail

The eviction order, which has been served on the Commissioner of Police Mr Mathew Iteere, dictates that the eviction must be?effected?without fail from LR Mombasa/Mainland South/Block 1/363, LR Mombasa/Mainland South/block 1/1031, LR Mombasa/Mainland South/Block V/109 and LR Mombasa Mainland South/Block V/110.

When the Waitiki family surfaced in court in August this year to enforce the 11-year-old order Adoli?pleaded with the court to seek alternative ways to settle the dispute.

The police requested that the Government take over the land, compensate the owners and distribute it to the squatters.

Waitiki has sued Kenya Power for erecting power lines  “to supply power to the trespassers.”

They further declare in an affidavit sworn against Kenya Power on June 25 this year that those occupying the land must “cease the trespass.”

Justice Francis Tuiyot had been expected to visit the property yesterday, but failed to do so as he is away from the station.

The Waitiki family lays claim to the land on the basis of four title deeds showing they bought it in 1975 from a Ms Guldawood for agricultural use.

However, in 1980 Kamau Waitiki received permission to convert it to commercial use.

He says he has had a protracted war with trespassers since 1999 “who went by the name Maweni Land Development Committee and the area Member of Parliament” having tried, unsuccessfully, to commit past Government officials and police commissioners to civil jail for failing to enforce the eviction orders.

Abandoned land

He alleges that between 2001 and June this year he tried to enforce the order through press advertisements and letters but failed.

Speaking to The Standard at the Mombasa Law courts on Friday, Waitiki denied claims he had abandoned the land to invaders.

“The land belongs to me because I am a Kenyan entitled to own property and the State is under obligation to protect me and my property,” said Waitiki.

Accompanied by his relatives, Waitiki?said he had lost hope of regaining ownership of his land until the new Constitution was promulgated.

“I want nothing?but my land because this is a right which must be protected?unless I cease to be a Kenyan citizen” said Kamau. He complained that the provincial administration in Likoni played a big role in the sale of his land to private developers. In his affidavit signed on August 21 this year Waitiki says he wants Iteere committed to civil jail for six months for disobeying the November 8, 2001 eviction order issued by Justice Andrew Hayanga.

Waitiki says he had earlier made an attempt to commit?previous commissioners of police to jail?for disobeying orders, but?the case was?dismissed on procedural technicalities.

The court granted him a leave to serve Iteere through The Standard?and another local daily.

The same was published last year and on October 21. He says several committees were put in place to look into how to evict?120,000 people living on the land, but have been unable to reach a consensus.

But Adoli, in a sworn affidavit, says the occupation of the land started in 1997 following tribal clashes in the area. He says most of the landless people displaced by the clashes settled illegally on the land, which was not occupied at that time.

“The Government should find a way to survey and legalise the land occupied by the squatters at a fee,” says Adoli.