The National Assembly Environment and Natural Resources Committee has saved the multi-million shilling Seefar Apartments in Nairobi from demolition.
The Committee has ordered the immediate withdrawal of a notice of demolition issued to the owners of the multi-story residential building in Nyayo Highrise.
The notice was served last year by the Water Resources Management Authority (Warma) and the National Environment Management Authority (Nema) for allegedly standing on riparian land.
The Parliament Committee says the fate of the structure will be decided by the government’s multi-agency team.
“It is hereby ordered that the demolition notice issued for the demolition of Seefar apartments be vacated,” the committee chair Kareke Mbiuki says.
The Mbiuki-led team questioned how the two agencies issued the notice without reference to any technical report.
“How was the decision to demolish Seefar apartments arrived at, when this committee has not received any report recommending the same?” poses Mbiuki.
Appearing before the Committee, the secretary of the National Buildings Inspectorate Moses Nyakiongora told the MPs that Seefar apartments are “structurally safe.”
He, however, says part of the structure stands on the course of the Ngong River.
“The building can remain, but something must be done to the dam for the safety of the apartments,” Nyakiongora says.
Late last year, the committee proposed the nearby Nairobi dam is destroyed in order to save the apartments. MPs who toured the site said the dam is no longer useful and it would be logical to sacrifice it to save the apartments.
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In May 2020 here is the news:
Over 8,000 residents of Kariobangi Sewage Estate in Nairobi were left homeless after the government moved to demolish the settlement.
The exercise was overseen by the Ministries of Land and Water in a move to reclaim the land parcel that had been reserved for sewerage facilities.
Residents on Monday, May 4, woke up to demolitions by an excavator which was under the guard of armed police officers.
Speaking to journalists, Senior Counsel John Khaminwa, the lawyer representing the residents revealed that he had obtained a court order stopping the demolition but it was not obeyed.
"I’m representing the Kariobangi Sewage Farmers self-help group. This self-help group has 376 members, they occupy a plot in Kariobangi area, the plot number is LR8285/1/1. They have occupied it since 1996, the total population is about 8,700 people who stay there.
"They are humble people who stay in this particular plot. They approached us yesterday and we wrote several letters to the officials in the government to ask them not to evict them. We should probably have a discussion or a conversation to see how we can sort out this issue.
“We eventually decided to go to court, we drafted the document and placed this document before the high court. We were to get in touch with the Chief Justice to give us a judge to hear the matter, indeed he did so and the matter was placed before a judge Justice Okong’o,” stated Khaminwa.
The lawyer added that the judge made the orders in their favour and served the police with the order which stated that evictions and demolitions had to be halted.
The Kariobangi Sewerage Treatment Plant meant to occupy 30.2 hectares (74.6 acres), was classified as at-risk, with 13.64 hectares (33.7 acres) already encroached on.
A woman from the area produced documents of the contentious piece of land stating, as many of the residents argued, that she had legally purchased the land.
"In 1996 we were given documents for this land, we have the title and lease. We pay land rates to City Council (County Government of Nairobi).
“There was a survey, they divided the land between ours and for the Ministry of Water,” claimed the woman.
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Ukoo flani’s Kamah alisema:“HII VITA IMEPITA RANGI YA NGOZI NA KABILA NAJUA NI MBILI TU…”
They coddle middle-class Kenyans. Zile marungu wanaume wamepigwa kwa vichwa by D- wengine hadi wakakufa, were in lower income parts of Kenya.
Remember how well those young men and women who were drinking in that ambulance were treated? Like they were going into a concert.
Poor people have no rights or dignity in Kenya.
In some countries like Brazil the poor people do not allow police officers to walk inside the ghettos without heavily armed backups. They learned that police are not their friends.
