Why Mandera's land regularisation project is a major milestone

A section of Mandera town. Since independence, only Mandera Township has been classified, planned, and surveyed as urban, but the rest of the county remains largely unplanned and unclassified. [File, Standard]

There is no doubt that land is the backbone of Kenya’s economy and a critical source of livelihood for the majority of its citizens. More than just a physical resource, land in Kenya holds deep political, economic, cultural, and emotional significance. For decades, however, the lack of clear land tenure systems, particularly in arid and marginalised regions like Mandera County, has undermined development, created inequality, and left thousands of people exposed to poverty and displacement.

But in a historic and commendable development, the County Government of Mandera has initiated a large-scale land regularisation and tenure security project, which has resulted in the processing of 8,500 parcels of land in a two-phase initiative. This includes 5,317 parcels in Phase 1, which received a public notice on September 3, 2025 by the National Land Commission, in accordance with Section 14 of the Land Act. This development cannot be overstated—it is the largest land regularisation exercise in Mandera’s history. It marks a long-overdue step toward economic empowerment and social justice in a region that, until now, has had fewer than 950 titled parcels in a land mass spanning over 26,000 square kilometres.