Kyeni Forest farmers protest displacement

A group of 867 internally displaced persons (IDPs), forced out of Kyeni Forest in Thika District in early June and who have been living in a roadside camp in Huruma, Thika, since, have complained that they were harassed, intimidated and beaten by forestry officials into leaving their forest homes of eight years. Huruma camp committee chairman Gad Wainaina told IRIN that forest rangers had beaten the IDPs and burned their houses to the ground, forcing them to leave the forest where they had lived since 1993, with the consent of the government. Earlier this week, the process of moving the Huruma IDPs to a new plot back inside the forest began, “to remove them from the dangers at the roadside”, according to an official from the Thika District Forest Office. However, it was not known how long the IDPs would be allowed to stay on the new land, as it was only intended to be a temporary measure, he said.

The group had been living and farming in the forest with the consent of the Kenyan government since 1993, having fled political violence in surrounding districts that was associated with Kenya’s first multi-party parliamentary elections in 1992. The IDPs have claimed that illegal logging in Kyeni was taking place with the tolerance of forestry officials, while a Thika District forest officer told IRIN that the farmers were evicted because they were residing there illegally; although they had been permitted to cultivate land inside the forest, they were meant to travel to the land daily, while living outside the forest boundaries, he added.
Under a new relocation plan agreed by the government following pressure by local MP Patrick Kariuki, the Kyeni IDPs may be able to cultivate a different part of the forest than they were in, pay an increased but still nominal annual rent per hectare, and work a number of days a month (unpaid) for the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, planting trees. Some among the IDPs fear that the relocation plan is a ruse to move them from the roadside, and that violent attacks from forest officials could start again once they are out of public view, but that they have no option but to take up the government’s offer. “Our alternative is to die,” said one of their number. [for more details, see separate IRIN story of 31 August headlined: “KENYA: Kyeni displaced protest treatment, conditions”]