An initiative by President Uhuru Kenyatta to have 100,000 title deeds issued to residents of Eastlands by end of 2018 has hit a stone wall.
By end of last week, only 623 title deeds had been issued, almost a year after the President’s announcement.
Last year in May, President Kenyatta speaking in Jacaranda announced that he had issued 50,000 title deeds with a promise to make it 100,000 titles by December the same year.
Appearing before the assembly’s Urban Planning and Lands committee, county director of survey Cecilia Wangari admitted the process had faced obstacles in implementation due to legal problems and political interference.
Wangari said the county government has shown the desire to complete its part, noting that only little help was coming from the national government. “ The county was only supposed to issue 30,000 and the rest be done by the Ministry of Lands. So far we have issued 623 but we have another 27,000 that are awaiting signing in order to be released to the owners,” she said.
Lands and Urban Planning executive Charles Kerich said there was a misconception regarding the number of title deeds that were to be provided by the county government.
The 100,000 title deeds target was the collective target for both City Hall and the Ministry of Lands, he said.
City Hall was handling 30,000 titles while 70,000 were being handled by the Lands ministry.
“ When you talk about 50,000 title deeds, it was a collective target from the county as well as the ministry of lands.We brought our numbers, Permanent Secretary for Lands Nicholas Muraguri brought other numbers as well and we had an wholesome target,” Kerich said.
He said that 50,000 was a realistic target that could be achieved.
Kerich said the notion that somebody misled the President or gave wrong figures should be removed.
Antony Kiragu, chairman of the committee, asked Kerich to explain why the county chose to hire five external legal firms to conduct the process at a fee, yet they county has a legal department.
“As MCAs we have been receiving complaints from the public. Five law firms have been collecting money from people, so I fail to understand how within eight months only 623 titles have been issued,” Kiragu said.
Kerich said the county’s legal department is understaffed.
“Our legal department does not have capacity and that’s why we decided to hire five external law firms because if we chose to do it internally it would probably take us ten years. The fee of Sh30, 000 was also the bare minimum that the firms could charge and we felt it was fair,” he said.