The government has announced that it will revoke all the titles held by individuals and organisations in gazetted forests.
Environment Cabinet Secretary Soipan Tuya made the announcement at Ololua forest on Wednesday.
The Ololua forest has been at the centre of controversy after private developers attempted to grab 50 acres of the gazetted forest, causing outrage from key players.
The land grabbing reports prompted the Ololua Community Forest Association, Kajiado county residents and friends of Ololua Forest to stage a peaceful demonstration, which got the attention of the state.
On Tuesday, Tuya said she will make a fact-finding mission to Ololua Forest.
She said her ministry receives information about illegal forest activities in real-time.
Tuya said the illegalities have gone down after the state enlisted 2,700 forest rangers.
She praise the community forest association for coming out strongly and talking about the grabbing.
Tuya said she will also visit other parts of the country with reports on illegal forest activities.
She said her ministry will not tolerate any attempts to destroy forest resources, even as the state makes efforts to grow 15 billion trees.
“We are going to be very firm, both internally within our staff and with anybody else who goes out to interfere with our ecosystems,” Tuya said.
On Wednesday, the CS accompanied Forestry PS Gitonga Mugambi, Chief Conservator of Forests Alex Lemarkoko, Kajiado Senator Seki Lenku and Kajiado North MP Onesmus Ngogoyo, toured the contested forest land.
During the tour, the CS, with the help of Kajiado residents, demolished an illegal stone wall that had been built around the forest.
Experts said as an established conservation standard, the ministry and its partners should not build wall fences around forests and other ecosystems because of adverse impacts on biodiversity.
These walls also prevent free movement of wildlife.
KFS and the Institute of Primate Research are the only organisations authorised to collect revenue from the forest.
The Friends of Ololua say the forest covers 663 hectares (1638.31 acres)
They say the forest has 375 hectares (926.645 acres) of endemic forest, degraded (269.345 acres), eucalyptus (385.484 acres) and 24 hectares (59.3053 acres) excised for SGR, schools and roads.
Tuya said entities carrying out noble initiatives inside protected forests will be given special use licenses by the Kenya Forest Service.
A special user license is issued by KFS after following an elaborate process that starts with the assessment of the proposed site or proposed development.
A site assessment report is presented to CCF before a site assessment summary report and recommendations are presented to KFS board of directors for decision making.
On March 30, KFS denied claims that the forest was under threat.
KFS, in a statement, it said there is no individual who has been allocated land inside the protected forest resource.
“Following public concerns regarding the alleged grabbing of a parcel of Oloolua Forest in Kajiado County, L.R no. 23269, Kenya Forest Service seeks to make a clarification on the matter. The portion of land in question is currently occupied by four government agencies. There is absolutely no individual who has been allocated land within Oloolua forest” KFS said.
