Governor Kingi confirms ADC grabbed 237,000 hectares of land in Kilifi

 

A report by a team of surveyors from the national government and Kilifi has confirmed that the Agricultural Development Corporation (ADC) grabbed over 200,000 hectares of land in the county.

Governor Amason Kingi made the revelations during a meeting with Lands Cabinet Secretary Farida Karoney in Malindi to discuss the matter.

ADC grabbed land that belonged to locals, Governor Kingi told reporters, contrary to claims that residents had invaded land belonging to the agency.

ADC has grabbed 237,000 hectares and locals are aggrieved, he said, urging the Ministry of Lands and the National Land Commission to intervene and address the wrangling.

“The dispute is building up tension and there is a need for an urgent solution to the matter,” he said.

Residents in Malindi and Magrini sub-counties have been at loggerheads with ADC, saying it had denied them the right to be issued with title deeds for the land they occupy.

He promised locals that the matter urgently resolved.

“We have assured residents that the county government will work within all means to ensure that all parcels of land that they have owned from time immemorial are reclaimed and given back to the owners,” said Kingi.

The surveying and adjudication had to be halted after it was established that ADC has encroached on villages, he said.

The governor said that a Lands officer from the Malindi office had confirmed that there is a known boundary recognised by both ADC and residents, but that locals have been arrested for trespassing when they cross that line.

The current survey map shows the extent of ADC’s encroachment into the farms of residents.

The county and the Ministry of Lands, he said, had agreed to bring together other stakeholders to forge a way forward, he said.

Devolution Cabinet Administrative Secretary Gideon Mung’aro, also a former Lands CAS, also the meeting with CS Karoney.     BY DAILY NATION