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Why County Hall wants to repossess all grabbed land


Private developers who have built on land that belongs to the City County Government risk losing their property.

This follows an audit which revealed that multiple developments on plots were hived off from land set aside for schools, hospitals and other public amenities.

“In order to protect the city county land, all unsurveyed land should be surveyed and titles obtained and any that was allocated illegally should be repossessed,” said the audit report.

Survey

The county is currently undertaking a programme to identify and survey all its land before moving to reclaim plots that were grabbed.

Last week, the city government allocated Sh50 million in the next financial year to facilitate acquisition of titles for fixed assets, which is mainly land.

The allocation comes following multiple declarations by Governor Evans Kidero that county land especially that of schools which have been greatly affected would be recovered and any buildings on it demolished.

“Be assured that even if one built a Tower of Babel on the grabbed land, that building will be demolished and the land restored to the school,” said Dr Kidero in January.

According to the audit report, a project to fence off the county land to protect it from grabbers was used to isolate parcels that were then taken over by private entities. Other lands were irregularly allocated to private developers.

Two petroleum firms are some of the owners mentioned in the report as having been allocated land under unclear circumstances.

The report also added that a private developer was building a hotel on Lang’ata Road Primary School’s land even though the details of the allocation were unavailable.