LANDS Secretary Charity Ngilu yesterday named the directors of Airport View Housing Company Limited, which has been widely suspected of grabbing the Lang’ata Road Primary School playground.
Ngilu named Mandip Singh Amrit, Madat Singh Amrit, Harban Singh Amrit and Kamal Singh Amrit as the directors of the firm as of October 31, 2013, according to records filed at the Registrar of companies.
Ngilu, who has been under pressure to unmask the faces behind the company, at the same time said her ministry had written to CID Director Ndegwa Muhoro about further investigations and possible prosecution.
Dropping the bombshell on the owners of the company behind the illegal acquisition of the playground, Ngilu warned that the government will deal with the Lands officials who helped the firm appear to acquire the property.
"We have written to the relevant agencies to conduct investigations and prosecute officials, be it from the Lands ministry or the National Lands Commission, who may have helped greedy individuals to grab the land," a tough-talking Ngilu said at a press conference in her office yesterday.
She said the County Government of Nairobi, which approved construction work in the playground, had established that the documents presented were forged.
"We have said it previously – and let me reiterate – that the land belongs to Lang’ata Primary School," she said.
Ngilu made the disclosure even as one of the named individuals denied having any interest in the plot or the firms involved.
Harban Singh said he stopped being a director of Airport View Housing Limited 20 years ago. But he was hard put to explain how his name continued to feature in letters between the then Nairobi City Council and the Ministry of Lands 16 years ago.
Airport View has sued Nairobi County for trespass on the disputed land that was restored to the school on Wednesday.
The playground was at the centre of the demonstration at the school last Monday that saw police teargas schoolchildren, leaving several injured amid condemnation from Kenyans and consternation in world media.
Yesterday, Singh could not give details of how the firm in which he was once a director acquired the land. He also pleaded loss of memory on many questions we asked, claiming to be unwell and in hospital.
But documents in our possession show that there was correspondence addressed to Harban Singh in 1997 as well as 1999, in his capacity as a director.