Two days ago, casual laborers on a farm linked with Deputy President William Ruto in Mata village, Taita Taveta County, went on strike to protest non-payment of their wages, paralyzing operations.
Workers staged a protest at the Kisima farm’s gate on Monday, claiming they hadn’t been paid in six weeks.
According reports by Nation, the workers expressed dissatisfaction with the farm’s management’s hollow promises.
Some of the workers claimed they had been promised pay, but they promised to keep striking until they were paid.
Mr Alex Saidi said that farm managers had piled up salary arrears without informing workers.
So, what exactly is happening inside DP Ruto’s Kisima Farm?
Mkenya Leo has compiled details about the said farm:
Location
The 1,000-acre farm is located in Mata Ward, 27 kilometres from Taita Town, on Taveta-Jipe Road and overlooks Lake Jipe. He acquired the property from former MP Basil Criticos. The farm is managed by Arie Dempers, a Southern African.
The DP has stock hundreds of beef cattle and goats on the farm and has plans of introducing fish, poultry and maize farming.
History
First, DP Ruto is said to have bought the farm situated in Mata ward from former Taveta MP Basil Criticos more than five years ago.
Criticos is one of the biggest land owners in the county – at one time owning 72,000 acres. He has since shed off some of the land to other ranch owners and also donated a thousand acres to deal with squatters who have for years invaded his expansive farms.
President Uhuru Kenyatta’s family is also one of the landlords in the area.
During the 2013 presidential debate, Kenyatta said his family owned 33,000 acres in Taita Taveta County through their expansive Gicheha farm.
His family has since then donated 2,000 acres to squatters in the county.
For the sake of history, the farm was part of the disputed 2,700-acre farm disputed land that hosted more than 5,000 squatters before they were evicted.
The farm had been on a 99-year lease that was granted in 1914 to Captain Morgan. Morgan later transferred it to Criticos’ father George Criticos. It expired in January 2014 and Criticos had been pushing for its renewal since then.
The Machungwani farm has been the epicentre of disagreement and unending court battles between Criticos, area leaders and the squatters.
According to reports, Criticos, who was then a former Health assistant minister, allowed the landless people to settle on the agricultural rich farm as a campaign strategy in the 1992 and 1998 general elections.
“He lured voters by allowing them to settle in parts of the land. He had promised them that he would let them own it,” Taita Taveta Senator Mwaruma said.
However, Criticos has separately claimed there are no squatters on the farm and that those settling on the farm were mere land grabbers. He accused the government of failing to protect the land from invasions by squatters.
Controversies
In 2020, Deputy President William Ruto was at the heart of a scandal after the Taita Taveta County government and residents of Mata village in the same county accused him of diverting their public water to his expansive ranch.
