Women’s group claims part of public school’s land
By Geoffrey Mosoku, April 3, 2025A public high school in Kamkunji, Nairobi, risks losing part of its land, which is being claimed by two separate entities, including a women dancers’ group.
Galole Women Dancers Group claims it has a valid title deed for a parcel that is within the seven acres occupied by Maina Wanjigi Girls Secondary, a public school.
The group claims it owns the land. LR No. Nairobi Block 49/977, measuring 0.3302 hectares (about three-quarters of an acre), valued at around Sh210 million.
Their claim was communicated to the Ministry of Lands by Kamukunji Deputy County Commissioner Fredrick Martin Muli.
In a March 13 letter, Muli asked the director of survey to send a surveyor to establish the boundary between the school’s untitled land and the one claimed by the dancers.
“I personally visited the site but could not determine if the disputed piece of land is separate or part of the school land,” Muli writes.
“In light of the above, I am requesting your good office to send a government surveyor to establish the facts in order to enable this office to settle the dispute between the two parties.”
Spoofing numbers
Yesterday, area MP Yusuf Hassan and Sub-County Director of Education Luley Abdullahi Yahya insisted that the land belongs to the school.
There have been several attempts to grab the land by developers who use various groups, Hassan said.
“We stand by Maina Wanjigi Secondary School against land cartels and people trying to grab public land. That has always been my stand,” he said.
The dispute was escalated to Jogoo House and is being handled by the Ministry of Education’s legal office, Yahya said.
She confirmed that the land being claimed by the dancer group is within the school compound that was fenced by the ministry in 2018 to protect it from previous attempts to grab it.
“When these people claimed the land, we wrote to the ministry and asked for facts and the legal department is handling it. The perimeter wall was erected by the Ministry of Education in 2018,”she said.
Muli said yesterday he had halted his request for survey work after a third party emerged to claim ownership.
“The matter is becoming murky and complicated and we had to stop the survey as a third party [a Mr Kariuki] claiming the same parcel of land emerged,” he said.
The school land, he said, does not have a title deed.