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"id": 197167,
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"speaker_name": "Mr. Kingi",
"speaker_title": "The Member for Magarini",
"speaker": {
"id": 27,
"legal_name": "Amason Jeffah Kingi",
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"content": " Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. My names are Jeffa Kingi, the Member for Magarini Constituency. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, may I take this opportunity to thank the people of Magarini for electing me and showing confidence in me. I hope they will reap from their choice. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I rise in support of His Excellency's Address. It was such a wonderful speech. However, unless we are willing to move an extra mile--- We can speak so well, give wonderful speeches, moving speeches, but, if we are not committed to actualise and put what we say in action, then, however beautiful those speeches may be, we will not be able to make any mark. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we have just come out of a period of turmoil as a country. I want to take this opportunity to thank the institutions and personalities who were involved in bringing sanity back to this country. I want to thank the Annan-led team, the hon. Member for Langata, Mr. Raila Odinga, and His Excellency President Mwai Kibaki for having come together to save this country. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, what we have witnessed is a political settlement and, certainly, this directly benefits politicians. They are going to benefit out of it. However, as a House, we need to find a social settlement for Kenyans, so that they can also be able to reap. What happened after the elections; the violence that was witnessed immediately after the results were announced, many people may think that it was as a result of a \"stolen\" election. However, to me, the flawed process that we witnessed was just a catalyst. We know there were underlying factors that caused people to hack each other down. For a country to move forward, then we need to sit, look back, investigate and come to know what really caused what we saw after the elections. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, it is historical injustices which led Kenyans to hack each other. For us to move forward, we must address the historical injustices that have been perpetuated by Government after Government, including the colonial Government. One of the historical injustices is the issue of land. My constituency is located within the coastal belt. It runs from the Indian Ocean. There is a problem with the coastal belt, mainly the Ten-Mile Coastal Strip. The historical injustices touching on land at the Coast started way back in the period of the slave trade. I believe this is the period around 1895, when the British and German imperial governments established what is now known as \"the Mwambao \". Later on, they ceded control of what is known as the Mwambao to the Sultanate of Zanzibar. By then, the slave trade was at its peak. Arabs who had come to settle at the Coast were rummaging for slaves and establishing permanent establishments to consolidate trade between East Africa and the Middle East. At that point, the indigenous people were being pushed away. Their land was now beginning to be taken away. The other period ran up to 1908. The British Government, being very anxious to bring a 322 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES March 20, 2008 very alien concept of land ownership; that is, the private land ownership, promulgated an ordinance called the land title ordinance; what is presently known as title deeds. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the 1908 land titles ordinance had very far-reaching provisions. One of the provisions was that any person living within the 10-mile Coastal Strip had six months to lay a claim. After the expiry of the six months, if the claim was not laid, the land that was left unclaimed would become crown land. The indigenous people were not made aware of that particular ordinance. So, at the end of the day, 90 per cent of the Coastal Strip was taken by the Arab immigrants and the 5 per cent became crown land. Upon Independence in 1963, because that is the time when the indigenous communities' fate on land ownership was sealed, the Independence Government, instead of going back to correct that mistake. The independence constitution stated that any land that was acquired. However acquired before Independence was recognised by the independence Government. That is the time that the coastal people, mainly the Mijikenda, had already been moved out. They never owned any land. The land that was there was owned by the Arab immigrants. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, immediately the Independence Government took over the reigns of power, it started to address these injustices. In the first decade, it tried to reactivate colonial settlement schemes; these were Gedi and Shimba Hills. But the biggest problem was that these schemes ended up benefiting very influential individuals in the Kenyatta Government, such that the local Mijikenda person did not benefit from these settlement schemes. The second attempt was in 1975 when this House set up an Inter-Ministerial Committee to investigate the issue of historical injustices within the 10-mile Coastal Strip. It had so many recommendations. However, none of them have so far been implemented. That report is within this House gathering dust somewhere. The third attempt was in 1976 when this House set up a Parliamentary Select Committee, again to investigate the issue of land within the 10-mile strip. That particular Committee came up with far-reaching recommendations, which included the issue of the Government buying land and distributing it to the locals so that the local Mijikenda people could own land. That Report is also gathering dust in this House. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I am speaking about this issue because sometime last week, Mr. Kiunjuri pleaded that this House comes up with a special committee to look into the issue of land. However, we have many reports which are lying in this House. I have already mentioned the issue of the Inter-Ministerial Committee which was formed in 1975, the Parliamentary Select Committee of 1976, the Ndung'u Report, the Njonjo Report and many others. When this House is serious and wants to confront the issue of land head on, then we have enough material that can help us come up with a policy that can make sure that land is equitably distributed to all citizens of this country. That is why I will go to my opening remarks; that we can say so much, but as a long as we do not have the will or commitment to take an extra mile to actualise what to come up with, then the issue will remain as it is. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the issue of land has been very confusing. It has been confusing because there are very many statutes that deal with land matters. We know that there is only one Kenya. However, you will find that there is the LK, which is applied mainly at the Coast, we have the LRA, GLA and other statutes which are very confusing. I believe that this House should pass--- I beg to support."
}