The government has reignited efforts to evict squatters and illegal occupants from land belonging to the Kenya Petroleum Refineries Limited (KPRL) in the Port Reitz area of Mombasa County, raising alarms over the looming risk of a potential disaster.

Energy and Petroleum Cabinet Secretary Opiyo Wandayi (pictured) said the government has initiated plans to evict the occupants by first targeting the “big fish” who have put up rental houses in the area and have been collecting rental income from the said “squatters.”

 Speaking after touring various facilities during his maiden working tour of Mombasa as Energy CS, Wandayi noted that he is determined to permanently resolve the protracted matter which he described as a disaster in waiting, if not urgently addressed.

Noting the government has a duty to protect lives and property of Kenyans, the CS warned the eviction process will start with the big shots who have erected rental houses in the area.

“The continued occupation of the land by the residents creates serious problems because one, it endangers the lives of the residents because their settlements are just at the foot of the oil pumps or petroleum products linking with the mainline that goes to Nairobi. This is very serious because if something were to happen in our facility at Kipevu then a lot of havoc will happen and that is something that we can’t allow to happen under our watch, ” the CS said when he addressed journalists at KPRL facility currently under the process of amalgamation with Kenya Pipeline Company (KPC).

Storage facilities

According to Wandayi, the occupation is in itself a time bomb in waiting, expressing fear that should anything occur at the settlements, the country would incur a damaging loss as the KPRL storage facilities, including the surrounding settlements and beyond are likely to go up in flames. Cougnizant of a court order requiring the squatters to vacate, Wandayi announced that first and foremost, the government will give reason a chance noting they will closely with the County Government of Mombasa, local political leadership and the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum, to find a mechanism of vacating the occupants.

“Ultimately if that does not happen for whatever reason we are under a moral and legal obligation as a government to ensure that place is cleared just to save lives and also to protect the strategic national facility. The bigger culprits are not the small people calling themselves squatters. The culprits are the big fish who have gone ahead to put up rental houses on that piece of land. These are people with means to relocate and do their business elsewhere.,” Wandayi said