The Kajiado County Assembly has slammed the county’s Executive body for demarcating the Kajiado Demonstration farm to build offices without public participation.
The Committee on Lands, Physical Planning, Housing, Urban Development and Municipalities had held a session with the line Department of Lands in effort to follow up on the responses issued by the Department regarding the Status of the farm.
The Department admitted that the land is registered as a school farm reserved for agricultural use, research, technology transfer and livestock improvement area but it has been demarcated for other purposes.
The department revealed that seven government entities had been issued with allotment letters to facilitate the Development initiative.
These include Construction of County Government Headquarters, Establishment of Industrial Park, County University, Recreational & Culture Center, County Staff Housing areas and Retained livestock promotion unit.
Lands County Executive Committee Member (CECM) Hamilton Parseina said the proposals remain tentative awaiting deliberation and approval by Cabinet.
Nominated MCA Joyce Sunte said that the Department had acted against the provisions of Physical Land Use Act, Section 40 (iii) which stipulates that the Executive has to undertake public participation.
The Majority Leader, John Loisa (Dalalekutuk MCA), said that the available limited space for pastoralism research has shrinked to the disadvantage of livestock keepers.
Loisa underscored that the Demo farm is a very useful asset for the county government.
Ewuaso Oo’ Nkindongi MCA Joseph Toris called on the Department to undertake their mandate with the seriousness that it deserves by following the stipulated laws and regulations in effort to protect Public Land.
“It’s astonishing that among the Big 4 Pillars that the Executive seeks to implement is Modulated Pastoralism which requires huge acreage of land like Demo farm to do Livestock improvement and research, in reverse we have demarcated the Demo Farm for Building of Offices, completely hampering the efforts to support Modulated Pastoralism,” said Toris.
The Committee further called on the Department to ensure that the Land Policy and Land Bill be fast tracked to give solutions to challenges caused by public land issues.
By Obegi Malack | obegimalack@gmail.com
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