• The large family of Kameng’ich cemented the grave of the late Paul Kipchabas, 65, who died after a short illness, adjacent to the school gate.
• Say they were fulfilling the old man’s instruction to be buried there.
Image: JOSEPH KANGOGO
A family in Koroto, Baringo North county, on Saturday buried their kin in a secondary school compound over unresolved land dispute.
The large family of Kameng’ich cemented the grave of the late Paul Kipchabas, 65, who died after a short illness, adjacent to the school gate.
“My father ordered to be buried in his ancestral land, where he was born and his umbilical cord buried, before he died,” his son, Francis Chebor, said.
Chebor said until his death, his father had been making frantic efforts to reclaim his encroached ancestral land in vain.
“He had approached the area chief and the elders who turned him down. He then went ahead to petition the court,” he said.
Chebor further accused professionals from the area of ‘bulldozing’ to have the school constructed on their family land without consulting them.
He said what they did is final and they won't allow anybody or even the government to exhume the body.
“This is our family land and we have nowhere to go,” he said.
His brother, Andrew Chelimo, and sister Veronica Ruto said nobody bothered to listen to their father when he was still alive.
Zachayo Chemosong, 50, also a brother to the deceased, said they couldn’t go against Kipchabas's instructions.
“This is the exact place where he said he would like to be buried and nowhere else. So his final word had to be respected” Chemosong said.
He said while alive the deceased had built his house and fenced the disputed compound.
“In fact, the land that the elders allocated Koroto Secondary School is far away from here but only a few jealous individuals decided to force their way to have it constructed inside the late old man’s land,” Chemosong said.
He said they have been kind enough as a family to allocate several farms for public utilities such as Sesoi, Akoroyan, Kampi ya Samaki primary schools.
"But we haven’t been consulted on this one. Even God cannot allow grabbing or taking someone’s property by force,” he said adding that the family is eagerly waiting for the court's verdict.
But retired Canon Moses Kwonyike, who hails from the area, denied claims the deceased man owned land within the proposed school's compound.
"He is a masquerader who when he heard the school is about to be constructed, he left his original house four kilometres away to build adjacent to the allocated school land," Kwonyike said.
He further said the case is in court and the body will have to be exhumed and the elders called to do a ceremony to appease the gods.
Baringo North MP William Cheptumo on Monday condemned the move, saying if there is an issue, “then may the elders, stakeholders and the family concerned should sit down and resolve it once and for all”.
Cheptumo urged locals to sit down and resolve the land dispute amicably.
He recalled that professionals and leaders from the area planned a fundraiser last year to put up a secondary school in Koroto hoping it will bring education closer to the people.