Ex-Prisons boss kin to know fate of 800-acre land
By Oliver Musembi, June 13, 2023The Land and Environment Court will tomorrow deliver judgment in a case in which former Kenya Prisons boss Reuben Mutua’s family is fighting to save their 800-acre farm at Emali in Makueni County.
The matter is before Justice Theresia Murigi who last Wednesday said the court will rule on the matter ex-parte.
The family of the late Mutua, a one-time head of the Prison Service, is battling squatters for possession of the land.
The Attorney General and Makueni County government are among the respondents.
Mutua, who is said to have acquired the land with the help of the then President Daniel arap Moi, died in a road accident in 1986, before he could secure a title for the property.
But squatters are claiming ownership of the land situated at Kinyoo area near Emali Township.
Mutua’s family is represented in the case by his son Peter Mutua.
Mutua’s family is relying on, among other grounds, a 2003 ruling by Justice Phillip Waki against an attempt by the squatters to lay claim on the land. They have also cited a 2009 court ruling ordering South Eastern Kenya University to move to repossess its 5,000 acres of land.
The younger Mutua says that after his father’s death, their mother took over as administrator, but she too did not complete the title processing by the time of her demise in 2002.
He adds that both parents are buried on the land alongside his sister, brother and a sister-in-law.
Mutua argues that before their mother died, his elder brother was responsible for the farm, and that he leased it to residents of Kongo village without proper agreements.
The lease, he says, continued until the family issued an eviction notice to the residents after their mother died.
“When the notice was issued, the tenants took us to court claiming that we were not the owners of the property,” Mutua says.