Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from the 1992 ethnic clashes in Thessalia, Muhoroni have once again called on the government to resettle them as promised.
According to the group’s representative David Oketch, they have met all the conditions given to them by the government for resettlement but they now have been subjected to a blame game between the responsible government agencies.
Oketch said that each family had to raise Sh10,500 after the government said it had identified a piece of land in Miwani area of Kisumu.
“We were told to raise the money by last year January, and all the 200 families complied. The promise was to resettle us by March last year. Now it is a year later and we are still suffering in camps,” said Oketch.
Now the locals feel that they have been deceived, following the blame game over their resettlement.
“Many have now lost trust in the authorities, because we paid our money and now there is no land,” said Oketch.
However, Oketch said that they paid the money reluctantly, because victims of the 2007 post-election violence were resettled for free. They were assured of the acquisition of land as the officials from the lands office said surveyors had done their work and had already laid beacons, but months later they have not received any communication regarding the resettlement.
“After making the payments, we were assured that relocation would be finalised soon but up to date there is no official communication, We have tried following up the matter with the lands office, who in return shift blame to the district commissioner saying he has delayed in identifying the location for establishment of a police post,” said Oketch.
He added: When the land was identified, we were only asked to pay the money and sit back as the government would take care of everything on our behalf. Contrary to that, we are doing the donkey work moving from office to office.”
Their efforts to seek assistance the governor have also been futile as they are being told the county government has done its part. The refugees have threatened to demonstrate for them to be resettled because many are suffering in the camps which have unbearable conditions.