New land-related killing in Kiambu adds to long list of executions

The killing of rancher Sudhir Shah in Kiambu on Saturday has brought to the fore the high stakes involved in land deals.

Mr Shah, who was a director of Ndarugo Plantation 1960 Ltd, joins the list of high-level directors who have died at the hands of powerful land barons.

Detectives in Kiambu suspect that the killing of Mr Shah, 66, in the 1pm incident was premeditated. He was with nine of his fellow directors in a secluded area and he was the only one who was picked out.

“It was as if he was wilfully led to his killers. Investigating such incidents has challenges, because these cartels immediately start manipulating investigations,” said a detective privy to the matter.

Long career administrator John Kaguthi says land and man –especially the Mt Kenya region man – have a relationship that is sometimes evil.

“If you look at the happenings in the land sector for the past six decades, you will find that they have been synonymous with bloodshed. The freedom war was staged on the premise of recovering land taken by colonialists,” he said.

Mr Kaguthi said land has become a measure of power and wealth and that is why “unscrupulous dealers will shed blood and move on with their lives as though nothing happened”.

Many ranches in Kenya, he said, have become killing fields and suggested that “all of them should be disbanded and shareholders get title deeds after the land is subdivided in a transparent exercise”.

Mr Kaguthi said greed and underhand dealings were the cause of bloodshed in ranches like Kihiu Mwiri in Murang’a, Embakasi Ranching Company in Nairobi and Mbo-I-Kamiti in Kiambu, among others.

Mbo-I-Kamiti has seen at least 15 high-profile murders and no one has been convicted for the killings.

On November 17, 2011, Waweru Njenga, who was a director at the ranch, was shot dead at 9am inside his car near his home in Githunguri village as he drove towards Nairobi.

His death was preceded by that of his fellow director, Ngamau Machua, who was shot dead as he waited to board a vehicle at the company’s Kabazi estate on January 5, 2010.

In 2001, two directors were murdered inside their houses as their families watched. The killers sank 12-inch nails into their heads in Kahawa Sukari and Juja estates.

Investigations revealed that there had been tussles over proceeds from land deals and no one was convicted for the murders.

Bishop Edward Nyutu, the Mt Kenya chairman of Indigenous Faiths, said killing in the name of land is as old as the Christian Bible.

“For those who are good readers of the Christian word, they must have encountered in First Kings 21 the incident about Ahab, his wife Jezebel and a vineyard owner in Jazreel village by the name Naboth,” he said.

Ahab wanted Naboth to surrender the land to him so that he could plant vegetables but he could hear none of it.

“Jezebel offered a solution to her husband that saw Naboth stoned to death and the vineyard acquired by Ahab for free,” Mr Nyutu said.

This should be a warning, he said, as God sent Elijah to prophesy to Ahab that “the very spot where dogs licked up Naboth’s blood, they will lick up yours too”.

The punishment was extended to Jezebel, who was condemned that dogs would eat her flesh in Jezreel “and too that dogs will also eat the bodies of your relatives who die in town, and vultures will eat the bodies of those who die in the country”.

In Kirinyaga and Kiambu counties, similar murders have rocked ranches in South Ngariama, with politicians and administrators cited as instigators of confrontations as they schemed to grab public land.

“In our case, cartels had schemed to con people. Those who claimed ownership of land targeted by the criminals would be attacked and eliminated. But we as leaders refused to let the cartels set up base amongst us and today we have peace,” said Kirinyaga Jubilee chairman Muriithi Kang’ara.

Deputy Governor Peter Ndambiri said the Kirinyaga and Embu county governments and other stakeholders saw the danger and sorted out the mess before it escalated into bloodletting.

“These land cartels have their roots in greed and evil. Killing to get land or money is simply evil,” Mr Ndambiri said.

Six years have passed since Kenya was treated to another case of senseless bloodletting involving the Kihiu Mwiri land-buying company that prompted President Uhuru Kenyatta to intervene.

By that time, a systematic elimination of the directors had been orchestrated by a powerful cartel that is captured in various investigations to have brought together powerful administrators, politicians and technocrats.

The President visited the area after the killings spiralled out of control and shareholders started arming themselves to start an all-out war to defend their holdings against organised grabbers.

Directors Josphat Kibe Nyoike and Zakary Chege Kiratu had been murdered on July 7, 2015; Paul Muhuhi Bernard on July 28, 2015; and Peter Kimani Kuria on May 10, 2016. Dozens of others linked to the leadership of the ranch also disappeared without a trace.

All the suspects who had been arrested and charged with the murders have since been acquitted.

Accompanied by senior officials from the Interior and Lands ministries, the President ordered that the company be dissolved and all genuine shareholders of the 1,269-acre ranch be given title deeds.

“We have peace today even though more than 40 per cent of us are yet to get our title deeds. As we wait for the titling process to be completed, of importance is that the river of blood that was building up in this ranch has run dry,” said John Kariuki.

Lands Principal Secretary Nicholas Muraguri told the Nation that “indeed as we speak, there is a committee in place that is working on the logistics of delivering the presidential promise to area residents so that they can now be empowered to use their title deeds to improve their lives through development and trade”.

Dr Muraguri blamed the delay on the need to clean up “our land registries across the country where we had to shut down services as we also migrated to digital land records and just when we were about to resume, the coronavirus struck, forcing us to suspend services”.

Land-related killings were also witnessed at Embakasi Ranching Company, where for 16 years, leadership wrangles led to the deaths of several people, including two chairmen – Muhuri Muchiri in May 2006 and Mwangi Thuita in 2018.

Both died under suspicious circumstances in dingy lodgings and had been involved in land deals.

“It is unfortunate that President Kenyatta is leaving office before he has sorted our land affairs in a more proactive way. The President should not have left any of these ranches undissolved, and members should have been given titles,” said Embakasi ranching company chairman John Njoroge.

“While he had done his best to calm the murderous cartels, the murder of Mr Shah is a chilling warning that the land cartels are back.”

Mr Njoroge said “we have lost lives in land conflicts created by corrupt managements and where some would opt not to follow costly litigation, going for quick fixes”.

He said the murders occur when competing cartels tussle to sell shareholders’ properties, members fight for leadership and control, and those allocated prime holdings are eliminated so that takeovers can be executed.

Mr Njoroge said the government has been infiltrated by murderous cartels, making it an accomplice in the loss of lives.

“Take our case in Embakasi…. We have protested in the streets trying to tell the world that all is not well in our ranch. We are in a very fluid situation and we fear that the next killing fields will be amongst us,” he said.

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