• According to a statement by the council and signed by the council chair Migot Adhola, the title deeds will not be receded.
• Kinyua had said 30 acres will go to the WHO emergency hub while some will be donated to squatters.
Image: ENOS TECHE
Kenya University council members have declined an order that compelled them to hand over the institution's title deeds.
According to a statement by the council and signed by the council chair Migot Adhola, the title deeds will not be submitted to Head of Public Service Joseph Kinyua.
"We wish to inform you most respectfully, that we will be unable to accede to the request to the title deeds," the statement reads.
This letter was a response to a previous direction from Kinyua, requesting the varsity to hand over a section of its vast land.
According to the letters from Kinyua, 30 acres will go to the WHO emergency hub while some will be donated to squatters.
Another 10 acres will be donated to the Africa Centres for Disease Control.
Kinyua said 180 acres will go to the neighbouring Kenyatta University Teaching Research and Referral Hospital, which already sits on 100 acres donated by the university ten years ago.
Adhola distanced the council from the decision for the state to acquire Kenyatta University's land.
"If the due process of the law as foresaid was followed, the university would have been able to demonstrate that it requires every inch of its current land," Adhola said.
The council further termed the directive as 'unclear and unconstitutional' saying they were not involved.
"The council holds the considered view that such a decision cannot be lawfully made without involving and consulting the council," the statement reads.
On Tuesday, KU Vice-Chancellor Paul Wanaina could not hold back his tears while addressing the university staff over a land row.
In a meeting that he convened to address a land row pitting them and President Uhuru Kenyatta's administration laid bare his frustrations.
His address followed a directive by Kinyua that instructed the university to surrender nearly half of its land.
Wanaina read three letters from Kinyua, all sent last week, directing the university to surrender the title deeds by close of business Monday, July 11.
The VC revealed that the State has asked them to cede 410 acres but they refused
“This is probably the last time I am talking to you as VC. I understand a new council is being formed,” he said amid tears.