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Embakasi Ranching faction rejects land register in fresh row

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Land Chief Administrative Secretary Gideon Mung’aro. FILE PHOTO | NMG

A fresh standoff between the government and some Embakasi Ranching Company shareholders is brewing, posing a challenge to the title deeds issuance plans.

The faction insists the ranch is owned by not more than 3,000 shareholders who are in the founding list. However, the government insists on 15,000 shareholders because the original owners together with the management have been selling and allocating plots.

A presidential directive had initially set a February 1, 2018, deadline for issuing title deeds and winding up of the ranch.

Land Chief Administrative Secretary Gideon Mung’aro has since announced that he is ready with the final list of genuine shareholders.

But a cross-section of shareholders calling itself Embakasi Ranching original shareholders trashed the announcement.

“The President has since ordered that the register is cleaned off ghost shareholders, con men and fraudsters. The ministry has not met this threshold and any announcement to title the land will be resisted as has been the case for the past year,” said Joseph Njenga.

READ: Embakasi Ranching owners claim Kitengela, Syokimau land

“We have sent a memorandum to the ministry making it aware that out of the 35,000 parcels of land targeted to be titled, only 5,000 have since been verified and cleared to qualify for title deeds. There are more than 30,000 parcels that remain contentious,” he told the Business Daily.

He said corruption had seen plots swapped, double allocated and altering of genuine share register where some names had been deleted and replaced with those of land grabbers.

But Mr Mung’aro maintains that the ministry had scrutinised the register with the help of the ranch’s management, government officials and State House representatives.