Governor Joseph Lenku has assented the Kajiado Animal Welfare Bill 2023 into law to make provision for the protection of animals and connected purposes.
The law will deal with animal owners who abandon their livestock, and let them roam large.
The animals include horses, cattle, sheep, goats, swine and live poultry in the commercial category.
The law will also protect companion animals such as cats, dogs and all other pets kept in homes.
The duties of such animal owners are to ensure an adequate source of food and water, and adequate medical attention when they are sick.
They are also required to provide their animals with reasonable protection against injurious heat and cold.
The county government, according to the new law, will recruit scouts who will charged with ensuring the laws are followed to the letter.
The new law says that anybody found contravening it shall be liable to a fine of Sh50,000 or six months in prison if convicted.
The county will recruit animal protection officers, who will be acting on the directions provided by departmental directors or the CEC members of the concerned department.
Anyone found confining their animals to an enclosure or area with inadequate space, unsanitary conditions, inadequate condition or not providing the animals to exercise, will also be fined Sh50,000 or will serve a jail term of 6 months.
The same law also allows county government officials to confiscate animals found roaming large and place such animals under protection.
A director can order the roaming animals to be taken to a protection area and issue a 7-day notice to the owners.
Once the owners show up, the director is at liberty to release the cows to them or hand them to caregivers and fine the owners the cost of the animals fed on while under the hands of the caregivers.
The county officials, under the same law, can terminate the life of an animal found under stress or sickness.
The directors will have the discretion of holding, selling or handing to caregivers livestock or companion animals if they have proven that the owners are unable to protect them.
