HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept
{
"id": 9413,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/9413/?format=api",
"text_counter": 477,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Mbadi",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 110,
"legal_name": "John Mbadi Ng'ong'o",
"slug": "john-mbadi"
},
"content": "The first question that one would ask anybody who would purport to defend the Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) is whether the KAA had the legal right to order or ask for demolition of those houses. If that land really belongs to KAA, then the question that I would want to put to its management is: Why did they not secure their boundary? Why did they not fence that plot if it was outside their boundary; where were they when all these Kenyans were putting up such expensive houses? Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the effect of what we just saw is number one, it is affecting families. Most of these people, as I said earlier, are young Kenyans. These young Kenyans have just started to stabilize in life. I hear most of these young Kenyans have gone to banks to borrow money to put up dwellings – a place they could call home. Now, you render them homeless. They have loans to repay. How will these Kenyans survive? Where was the Government when they were putting up these mansions? I ask myself: If at all any Cabinet Minister, or even a Member of Parliament, had a house in Syokimau, do you think the houses would have been demolished today? My answer is no. If senior Government officers and police officers had houses in Syokimau, I am sure those houses would not have been demolished today. I do not even want to talk about the legality of who owns that land, but the fact that the Government allowed those people to settle in those areas is in itself an indictment of the Government of Kenya (GoK). Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, from the information I have, which can be challenged, is that so many Kenyans bought land from three groups. One of the groups, according to the information I have here, is called Uungani Settlement Scheme Self-Help Group. This particular group was allocated this land in 1996. It is very clear that since they were allocated this land, they have been paying fees to Government departments, and that money has gone to the Government Exchequer every year without the Government ever rejecting those fees. If people were staying on illegally allocated land, why did the Government not make correction at that point? Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I see that the KAA filed a case in 2004. I do not want to go into the details of the case, because I think the rules of this House do not allow us to do that. The year 2004 is when the KAA went to court, after waiting for a period of eight years from 1996. They took this Uungani Settlement Scheme Self-Help Group to court claiming that that land belonged to the KAA. The case had always been adjourned. Why? Because the lawyers of the KAA have always claimed that they were not ready to prosecute the case. They have forced the courts to adjourn. The case was supposed to come up on 17th October 2011 and the lawyers of KAA sought an adjournment on the grounds that they were not ready and wanted to file a list of witnesses. The suit was then adjourned to today, 15th of November but what happened? On 12th November, the same KAA, with the support of the Ministry of State for Provincial Administration and Internal Security, got the police officers. They got bulldozers and went and flattened the houses of these poor Kenyans. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I am really shocked by the behaviour of my Government. I am really ashamed that the GoK, after we passed the Constitution last year, and Kenyans thought we had broken from the past and that we were starting on a beginning--- We can still see the same barbaric acts that we used to see during the one party system in Kenya. We can still witness such kind of insensitive actions from the Government. Surely, even if you feel that these people--- I have so many documents here which I will table to show that these people have a claim on the land. I will table these documents and they are all signed. They are surveys and plans which were approved by the Commissioner of Lands and the Survey Department."
}