Confusion as Chakama residents fail to locate land for titles issued

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Deputy President William Ruto hands over a title deed in Kilifi County at a past event.Chakama residents have called on the government to help them locate their pieces of land two years after tittle deeds were issued PHOTO COURTESY
Residents of Chakama location in Magarini Sub County want the government to show them their pieces of land in the area.
This comes two years after more than 170 title deeds were released by President Uhuru Kenyatta to residents of the Chakama settlement scheme.
 Chengo Mure who is a village elder in one of the villages in Chakama said that many residents were wondering what to do with the title documents since they could not locate their specific pieces of and.
 He added that the allocations were skewed to favour non locals leading to many locals missing out on the allocations.
 “We have papers that we call title deeds but there’s no value for them because we cannot trace our rightful pieces as stated in the documents,” he said while displaying a title deed at Chakama chief’s camp on Tuesday.
 Chengo also wondered why some names were omitted from the original list of beneficiaries and replaced by outsiders arguing that the outsiders were allocated fertile lands along the River Sabaki while residents were pushed on the dry parts.
“We want the government to come and explain to us how the allocations were done because we now have neighbours who are totally new to us while some people are being forced out of their homesteads by some title owners who claim that the land is theirs according to the numbers of the title deeds,” he said.
 Benson Charo Karisa said that he was born and bred in Chakama and that during the first adjudication programme in 1978, he was among casual laborers who helped land officials adjudicate the land in phase one.
 “During that time we were told that the land will be a ranch and that locals will benefit. I was among the first people to be allocated land but the titles never came until during the 2017 general election campaigns that the government came with the title deeds,” he added.
 What pains him most is that even after the titles were issued, people were not shown the location of their lands and that many had opted to sell the title deeds at throw away prices.
He added that each individual was allocated 7.5 acres but many were selling them for as little as Sh. 150,000.
Rachael Zawadi Chengo said that a list of 170 people was drafted and residents signed it but only 100 of them got the titles while the rest were denied.
 She wondered how the area which has 400 households was only given 100 title deeds while another 70 went to outsiders.
“We in phase two registered our names but we were shocked when some of our names missed in the allocations,” she added.
The residents now want the government to come clear on the issue and help them get the correct information.
Institute of Participatory Development, a local nongovernmental organization based in Malindi has embarked on a sensitization campaign to enlighten residents on the importance of title deeds so that they do not sell them at throw away prices.

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