The Anchor February 2009

Teachers Sacco: Who is fooling who?

Beginning March, The An-chor will publish ver-ba-tim excerpts of an official audit report on Masaku Teachers Sacco. It exposes of the good, the bad and the ugly. For starters, sample this:

Mwalimu Centre.

The construction of Mwalimu Cen-tre was con-structed by the Sacco initially and later enrolled willing members who bought shares.

Teachers who registered as mem-bers of the in-vestment had their con-tri-butions sent in by TSC through the Masaku Teachers Sacco de-duction code. The money together with the sacco contributions was later trans-ferred to the Masaku In-vestments Account in Coop Bank of Kenya as explained by the former General Man-ager when in-ter-viewed.

According to the former General Manager, the 2006 transfers were for Rent payment by the Sacco (Tenant) to the Masaku In-vestment Com-pany (Land-lord).

During interviews with the man-agement of Masaku Sacco and Directors of Masaku In-vestment Com-pany Ltd., they de-nied knowledge of the trans-fers yet the sacco executive certified the transfers while the In-vestment Exec. withdrew the same.

It is hypocrisy therefore for one to say he/she did not know of the transfers. If indeed the in-vestment offi-cials never knew of the transfers, why did they con-cede to the con-version of the said transfers amounting to 9 million to sacco shares in the in-vestment? Who is fooling who in this case?

In your March issue.

The man to watch: Judge Waki

Justice Philip Waki: Is he hero or villain? The Judge of the Appeal Court in Kenya could be both in present day Kenya.

He certainly is a hero to the pro-gressive thinking class of Kenya that are also tied of years of ad-min-is-trative mal-aise that cul-mi-nated in the slaugh-ter of over 1000 Kenyans af-ter the 2007 election.

Waki may well be the villain for those other Kenyans who see him as waging a war of attrition against the state and its agents who may have been party to a scheme to re-move him from the bench in 2003 in the dis-graced corruption purge in the ju-di-ciary.

Even as his report domi-nates de-bate in every cor-ner of this re-pub-lic, Jus-tice Waki is clearly the unsung hero of the war against im-pu-nity, where Kenya’s poli-ticians, judges and Civil Ser-vants have played lip service to the rule of law for the years Kenya has been an in-de-pen-dent state.

Justice Waki stance, mani-fested in his report is vi-sionary. It comes at at time when Kenyans are tired of the current crop of leaders as is looking be-yond them to identify one spe-cial Kenyan who can guar-an-tee real positive change if elected Presi-dent in 2012. Can Waki be the man? Get in-volved in the search for the real Obama for Kenya in 2012 as this coun-try is in dire need of fresh lead-ership as nei-ther Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Kalonzo Musyoka, Martha Karua or even George Saitoti seem non starters if real change is to come to the man-agement of affairs in Kenya.

Waki who chaired the inquiry, an-tici-pating the usual un-will-ingness to administer jus-tice in Kenya had warned that should efforts to establish the tribunal be sub-verted; a list of suspects would be for-warded to the Spe-cial Pros-ecutor at the In-ter-na-tional Criminal Court in The Hague , Neth-er-lands

In his 500-page report handed over to President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga in October 2008, Justice Waki rec-ommended that the entity be given jurisdiction over crimi-nal cases par-ticu-larly against hu-manity and related to the 2007 post-election vio-lence.

Fears of establishing the Spe-cial Tri-bu-nal to try post-election sus-pects started showing when debate began in Parliment as some MPs disapproved the court. So who is Justice Philip waki?

The month of October appears to hold a lot for the dis-tin-guished judge. For

He was born in October 1949 in Macha-kos District and the month appears to hold a for-tune in his life. He was suspended as an appellate judge in Oc-to-ber 2003; and he was ac-quitted of the charges in Oc-to-ber 2004.

And on Wednesday, Oc-to-ber 15, Mr Jus-tice Philip Waki pre-sented his report to Presi-dent Kibaki — a bold report that lays bare, the ar-chi-tec-ture and execution of the post-election violence in which more than 1,200 people were killed.

The drafters of the report concealed the names of 10 prominent Kenyans in a se-cret envelope to be handed, not to Presi-dent Kibaki as the appointing au-thority of the commission, but to former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan for fu-ture pros-ecution before an in-ter-na-tional tri-bu-nal.

This scrupulous work, surely, has to be the prod-uct of a thorough team led by an im-peccable per-son in char-ac-ter — a man who has seen the highs and lows of life.

Of course Mr Justice Waki was not alone. There was Mr Gavin Alistair McFaden, a retired senior policeman from New Zealand and Mr. Pascal Kalume Kambale, an international law ex-pert from the DRC.

Justice Waki was last year’s Jurist of the Year. The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) — Kenya Chapter, awarded him the annual award in an event graced by Jus-tice and Con-sti-tu-tional Minister Martha Karua.

The award was for his role as chair of the Commission of Inquiry into the Post Election Violence (Cipev).

Waki received the award in a ceremony filled with pag-eantry and colour.

The renowned judge known for his work at the Akiwumi Commission and now Commission of In-quiry Into Post-Election Violence (Cipev) in his accep-tance speech, he said: “God works in mys-te-rious ways, His won-ders to perform.”

He went on: “When I re-ceived news about this prestigious award, I al-most said, ‘I do not accept your nomination’.”

He dedicated the award to the victims of post-election violence especially those who had the courage and decency to come and tes-tify before the commission.

“I dedicate it to the media for their con-certed efforts to ensure that there is in-for-mative, interactive and balanced de-bate on the Cipev report. The Cipev commissioners and staff, and my family for they re-mained strong support through-out my public life,” he said.

Karua, who was the guest of honour and is a past winner of the award, termed the Waki Report as a stroke of genius that should not be ignored. She assured of Government’s commitment that it would be implemented.

Four years ago, lawyer Mohamed Khan de-scribed Mr Justice Waki as “a very good” judge” and “of high es-teem”.

Nairobi Metropolitan min-is-ter Mutula Kilonzo — his friend, classmate at Macha-kos Boys School and lawyer — said the judge was “a man of in-teg-rity ... not a popu-list.”

When he was asked in Au-gust about the spirit of the commission in getting to the depth of the post-election violence, he said: “There is no question that we have the will to per-form as best as we can and the only limi-tation here is time, but we are doing our best to ensure the rules of natu-ral justice are com-plied with.”

The Court of Appeal judge knew from the day of his appointment that the world would be anx-iously awaiting his report with a critical eye.

And the silence, the hushed tones on Wednes-day evening in clubs and streets after the report was released pointed out that he had acquitted him-self.

He is no longer the judge who was sus-pended on allegations of corruption. This, perhaps, was the best language used to repay those who doubted his integrity five years ago.

The trauma of the victims of post-election violence must have rekindled the pain he went through as he fought off the charges leveled against him before a tribunal chaired by former Court of Appeal judge Akilano Akiwumi.

Mr Justice Waki was among 24 Appeal and High Court judges suspended in October 2003 over corruption claims against them in the Ringera Report.

Their salaries were stopped, their allowances withdrawn and they were ejected from Government-leased houses.

While others choose to resign, he and colleague Moijo ole Keiwua were among those who chose to face the tribunal, which was a consequence of the announcement of then Justice minister Kiraitu Murungi’s “radical surgery” of the Judiciary in 2003.

Mr Justice Waki was the first to appear before the tribunal to answer allegations of corruption and misconduct in a case he handled in Mombasa .

The case involved Mombasa busi-nessman Khurshid Ahmed Butt and lawyer Mohamed Khan who later described him as “very good judge”.

No end to limestone rights saga

as leaders oppose any monopoly

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he long standing dispute pitting two cement firms Athi River Mining and Bamburi Company has brought the multi billion project to its knees after the com-pa-nies resulted to court corridors to secure monopoly in the lime-stone deal.

Mutito MP Kiema Kilonzo ques-tioned in Parliament, resulting in an assurance by thr government through Local Gov-ernment assistant min-is-ter Njeru Githae that “the Government will stick to the eco-nomic policies of com-pe-tition and fair play in the limestone issue and that no company would be given ex-clu-sive rights “.

“The dispute in the area is purely commer-cial. And any investor is wel-come to start mining operation and es-tab-lish a cement plant in the country; Githae told par-liament adding the gov-ernment has no pro-vision for ex-clu-sive rights of in-vestment.

The fiery Mutito MP had sought Gov-ernment po-sition on the lime-stone conflict that has resulted to nu-merous court cases de-laying the an-tici-pated project that could bailed the residents from poverty occa-sioned by poor weather pattern.

Leaders from the region have ex-pressed fear that the ministry was being arm twisted and interfered with by high ranking Gov-ernment officials. First, it was a con-tention by Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka that Bamburi be given exclusive rights. Now the Office of Prime Min-is-ter, according to Mr Kiema, has volunteered to arbitrate in the feud.

Local MPs led by Water Min-is-ter Charity Ngilu oppose a monopoly in lime-stone mining in Kitui and assert that allowing monopoly in the lucrative limestone mining amounted to cutting board-room deals at the ex-pense of the interests of poor resi-dents.

Githae told leaders from the region to bring together the two companies and with-draw the suits and ne-go-tiate an out of court settlement so as to pave way for cement in-vestment.

Larfarge is seeking the intervention of President Mwai Kibaki to salvage its spir-ited fight for exclusive right to mine limestone in the region.

Larfarge which has a presence in more than 60 countries across the world had written to the top Kenyan leadership to se-cure the business in-ter-ests of its local sub-sid-iary, Bamburi Cement. The letter was cop-ied to Prime Minister Raila Odinga and Vice Presi-dent Kalonzo Musyoka.

In the letter Larfarge wanted President Kibaki to invoke powers vested in him under Section 118 of the Kenyan Con-sti-tution to take over the trust land and give it to its local trading com-pany which it claimed had the capacity to successfully carry out the project.

Bamburi Cement Company and Athi River Mining have been involved in a long standing conflict for control of the Mutomo limestone deposits, spanning an area of 180 sq kilometers prompting protests from the land owners who felt that they were being taken for a ride.

The two firms have been locked in a dis-pute since August 2007 on exclusive rights to mine in the area, some 250 kms from Nairobi . Both companies have manu-fac-turing plants in Mombasa.

Experts say that Mutomo is nearer to the main cement market in Kenya and which-ever company puts a cement plant there will make huge savings in trans-port costs hence have advantage over com-petitors.

The Mining Act defines Lime-stone as a common min-eral alongside with Sand and Building stone.

The licensing of common min-erals for pur-poses of mining falls under the ju-ris-diction of Local Au-thorities, and not under the Commissioner of Mines or the Office of President.

Following complaints by Bamburi that the County coun-cil was giving unfair ad-van-tage in the matter to its rivals, the Local gov-ernment ministry intervened to re-solve the dispute.

If the government’s decision is anything to go by, the resi-dents in Mathima and Kanziko lo-cations where the mineral has been hit will benefit great as the area will not only open up but infrastructure and power lines will be put in place in addition to job provision to the locals.

Last week, the land owners marched for 20 kilometres carrying placards and twigs to present their grievances to Presi-dent Kibaki through the area District Commissioner Joel Cherop.

The peasant farmers said if the Presi-dent acted on the ba-sis of the “misleading letter” they would stand to lose their farms which they in-her-ited from their an-cestors.

The DC told the farmers that the matter was being handled at higher level but con-fessed that he was not privy to the contents of the said letter be-cause he had not seen it.

Reached on telephone, Athi River Mining Managing Director Pradeep Paunrana said the letter by Larfarge obviously showed that the firm flouted procedures and was now so-lic-iting government’s help to gain mo-nopoly in the area.

Mr Paunrana said that his firm has al-ready started con-struction of 4,500 tons per day cement plant in Tanga , Tanzania at a cost of US$ 120 million, which does not derail their plans to invest in Mutomo if the dis-pute with Larfarge is resolved.

MPs from Ukambani region have main-tained that the country’s principle of com-pe-tition be up-held and that all in-vestors in the lu-crative in-dus-try be treated equally. They warned that en-cour-aging mo-nopoly would be a barrier to economic growth and fighting poverty asserting that the re-gion has enormous re-sources that need ex-ploi-tation. “If you allow monopoly, that investor will control the future of the cement industry in Kenya and lock other firms out of business hence causing massive job losses” said Mrs Ngilu, Kenya ’s Minister for Water.

“Her Kitui south counterpart Isaac Muoki said ‘’ we can not put all our eggs in one basket. We en-courage as many in-vestors as possible because the re-source is in plenty” he said adding that mo-nopoly was out of question.

Church group funds Dams in Mwingi to tune of Sh 20m

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HE Church World Service is responding to over-come poverty and other sufferings among communities, a senior official with the New York based non gov-ern-men-tal organisation has said. Mrs. Joyce Holly is the NGO’s Eastern Africa Associate Re-gional Director.

She said that they in the CWS are pleased to work for and with the community. “We do support the commu-nity towards the provision of wa-ter, food and health care among others. We have the opportunity to work for the needy for better life.” Holly said.

The phi-lan-thro-pist said that they in the Church World Service walk because the needy walk. “ In America , people are very rich but we are directly affected when there are other people suffering in the world. We can’t be comfortable when other people are unhappy due to poverty, hun-ger and health problems among other troubles. When one person is thirsty, we are all thirsty. We are building the King-dom of the Christ together,” she said.

Holly was speaking at the weekend to the resi-dents of the Kaikungu village in Nzauni lo-cation, Mwingi District where she had led a team of 14 Church World Service offi-cials in touring some commu-nity water projects they have already funded there. The projects are three sand dams that are under con-struction and one borehole that is already com-plete and operational.

The total funding for the projects is about 20 million shillings. Other CWS officials accom-pa-nying the director included Rev-er-end Kirk Kperucca and Mary Abiero. The NGO has funded the water projects through the Anglican Church of Kenya (ACK) Kitui Diocese. The diocese com-prises of Kitui, Mwingi, Mutomo and Kyuso Districts. During the function, the phi-lan-thro-pists also donated 100 bags of maize worth 270,000 shillings to the Kaikungu community.

The Diocesan Bishop, the Right Reverend Josephat Vundi Mule, who was present, thanked the donors for the gesture. And he asked other groups to emulate the CWS. Mule said that the CWS people’s funding of the water projects in Nzauni location is a wise hu-mani-tarian move saying that the very assistance is for the domestic uses and the livestock.

Addressing the function, the Rev-er-end Kperucca said that for many years they have worked to look for funds in America and other parts of the world to help the needy in the world. He told the gath-ering: “ Our churches have your blessings for us. We will take your work as a real story. We are always into actions with you.” And on her part, Abiero said that the Eastern Af-rica is facing drought due to global warming. “Let us protect our environment. Let us plant and conserve trees,” the CWS offi-cial said.

Abiero advised the resi-dents of the Ukambani region and other dry parts of Kenya to plant drought-resistant crops such as sorghum, millet, cassava and cowpeas so as to deal with perennial hunger.

Limestone mining debate goes to the House

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Miscellaneous civil suit in the High Court of Nairobi is to blame for the stalled Limestone mining and setting up a cement factory in Mutomo District, that has consequently denied locals employment.

And the government is willing to facilitate the operationalization of the deal only after the interested parties, Bamburi Cement Ltd. and Athi River Mining Ltd withdraws the suit.

Local Government Assistant Min-is-ter Robinson Githae told Par-liament the government had approved all the requirements to have the factory set up, but Bamburi Cement Ltd was not satisfied with the decisions and hence filed a suit No ELC\JR 84 of 2007 seeking judicial review an order of Mandamus Commanding\directing the 2nd respondent, District Commissioner Mutomo District in his legal capacity under the provisions of the Trust Land Act Chapter 288 of the Laws of Kenya as a licensing officer of the Applicant to mine, take and process the limestone deposit in Kanziko and Mathima area within the jurisdiction of the applicant thereof.

The company also sought an Order of Prohibition to be di-rected to the County Council of Kitui on one hand and Athi River Mining on the other.

This was aimed at restraining the council from granting a common minerals license to any other com-pany or right to any party au-tho-rizing such party to deal with or in the limestone deposits located in Kanziku and Mathima areas of Mutomo district.

Arising from the institution of the application by Bamburi Cement Ltd, Athi River Mining subsequently joined the proceedings as an interested party. “This marked the beginning of protracted legal tussles which have not been finalized to this day”, said Githae.

Delivering a Ministerial statement as requested by Kiema Kilonzo (Mutitu), the Assistant Minister also confirmed that his ministry communicated with the Ministry of Lands vide letter Ref. No. c\1142 111\(31) dated October 18, 2007, conveying approval of issuance of Lease to Athi River Mining Ltd in respect of Land located at Mathima measuring approximately 540 acres.

He further confirmed that Bamburi Cement Ltd approached his ministry in August 2006 to resolve the issue of mining rights in Mutomo District between the County Council of Kitui, Bamburi Cement Ltd and Athi River Mining Ltd.

“The issue of dispute, according to Bamburi, was that the County Coun-cil of Kitui gave them a single Business Permit instead of what they applied for a common Mineral License.

He said during a consultative meeting at the ministry’s Headquarters on October 1, 2007 attended by rep-re-sen-tatives of the two companies (Bamburi and Athi River), council offiocials and the District Commissioner Mutomo, among the decisions made in the meeting included, that the council parcel out Kanziku and Mathima locations into two blocks for purposes of limestone mining and that the council offer for lease one block per company.

However, after the full council meeting, 17 councillors swore an affidavit purporting to convey a contradicting resolution from what was contained in the official minutes.

Githae said the ministry in a letter dated October 3, 2007 directed the council to comply with the reso-lutions. The same was cus-tomized by the council by passing a resolution in a Special Full Council Meeting under minute 27\2007 whereby each company was offered the area in which they were already operating in. Bamburi was offered Kanziko area while Athi River Mining was given Mathima area.

“The attempts made by my ministry and the council to resolve the issue were meant to ensure fair play and bar any company from enjoying the rights of exclusivity”, he said.

But despite the efforts made by the ministry, the suit filed in the High Court, Nairobi halted all the plans to start mining and thereby denying thousands of locals’ employment.

“It is clear from what I have just enumerated that there has been a standing dispute in issues related to limestone mining in Mutomo District. I wish to appeal to all parties in the dispute to approach the issue with sobriety and objectivity with a view to reaching an amicable settlement”, Githae concluded his statement.

Latest reports indicate that Bamburi have written an appeal to Presi-dent Mwai Kibaki, telling him to invoke powers vested in him under section 118 of the Con-sti-tution to take over the land under the Kitui County and give it to Bamburi. The letter to Kibaki is written by French cement firm- Larfarge- who own Bamburi and still have a shareholding in Athi-River Mining.

The letter is the latest twist after a bid by Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka to harbitrate between the two investors ended in an em-barrassment with the VP openly campaigning for Bamburi, triggering a barrage of criticism by several Kamba MPs who are de-manding that room be created for as many in-vestors as possible to exploit the limestone deposits.

The story of the fight is never told without reports that the two cement firms have employed corruption as a means of winning the contract to mine limestone. For instance, why did the 17 councillors swear an affidavit to rename on a council resolution unless corruption was at play?

Keep off famine relief distribution, Yatta DC tells chiefs

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hiefs and their assistants in Yatta dis-trict will no longer participate in relief food dis-tri-bution committees.

Yatta District commissioner Mr John Kinjo said the ad-min-is-trators whose role in the ex-er-cise had raised eye-brows in the past should keep off the affair to facilitate fair and trans-parent input.

Mr Kinjo, how-ever, in-structed the ad-min-is-trators to only keep dis-tance ob-ser-vation to the ex-er-cise.

The DC said the dis-trict had al-ready re-ceived 2000 bags of maize that will be dis-trib-uted to the needy fami-lies in the area.

Addressing a pub-lic meeting in Ndithini mar-ket, the DC at the same time said the gov-ernment was in the pro-cess of pro-viding the hunger stricken farmers with relief seeds to enable them prepare their shambas in good time in readiness for the coming sea-son.

The DC played down claims by a local councillor Margaret Nthama, that two people had starved to death in the area.

He however, admitted having received one report of the kind from the area which he said took place in October last year.

“But I want to assure every body in Yatta district that the gov-ernment is committed to en-suring no body else dies of hunger in future as more relief food will be coming in ‘’ said the DC.

On sand harvesting, the DC said an ear-lier ban on the business stood adding that the business had attracted crime and immo-rality among the local commu-nity.

He however, said that those complying with the NEMA laws will have their cases reviewed on the issue.

The Machakos NEMA officer M/s Oceanic Sakwa, said the business had adversely destroyed local enviroment causing acute water shortage in the local rivers.

ABC Church: Lawyers begin epic battle over Will

LAWYERS for the Africa Brotherhood Church and the family of the late Bishop Nathan Kamolo Ngala begun a pre-limi-nary show-down over an appli-cation to provide a monthly sti-pend for the widow of the late church head.

Paul Kisongoa for the family made an application for an order for the sti-pend of Sh 40,000 each month ahead of a full hearing of the legality of a will the late Bishop allegedly wrote, naming whoever succeeds him as Executor of the will. Mr Kisongoa also demanded that a vehicle handed over to a daugh-ter of the late Bishop in com-pliance with the Will be returned to the family custody ahead of the hearing.

The application was met with instant opposition from Mr Muema Kitulu for the Church.

The lawyers faced off before the Macha-kos Resident Judge Isaac Lenaola. The now controversial will saw the departed patriarch bequeath a substantial part of his earthly be-longings to the Church he helped found in 1945.

In the will, Ngala decreed that his successor, whoever it will be, shall be the executor of the will. The family has sued Bishop Timothy Ndambuki, charging that the will was a forgery.

Bishop Ngala bequeathed several plots in Machakos town and all cash in his account to the church and rounded it up by bequeathing to the church any other property associated with him that he had not apportioned in the will.

His last born and favourite son, Francis Muoki, whom his widow had sued to-gether with Bishop Ndambuki, is also listed as a key beneficiary of the estate of the late Bishop, being apportioned a farm in Katelembu where he lives. Muoki’s children who are minors were given two buildings in Mitaboni. The bishop be-queathed to his widow his matrimonial home and all the live-stock thereon and decreed that she would own the property and upon her death, they would then revert au-to-matically to Mr Muoki. All the other sib-lings of the late Bishop are be-queathed with prop-erties where they live- in Mitaboni, Kibwezi and Mombasa.One of his Nairobi based daughters was decreed to inherit a pickup car that the bishop used, which she claimed and was given by Bishop Ndambuki.

Justice Lenaola will deliver a ruling on issues raised on March 3.

Muoki has been battling a dismissal and excommunication order from the church that was approved unani-mously by the Church’s General Council. It arises from accusations of impropriety on the part of Mr Muoki when he was head of the De-vel-opment Department of the church.

Mwingi Priest backs Kalonzo

A catholic priest in Kyuso district has supported a bid by the Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka’s bid to have some Constituency Development Funds (CDF) to be utilised to mitigate the effects of famine.

Father Patrick Marete of the Kyuso Catholic Parish said in addition to the CDF, other Government devolved funds should be used to set up structures to beat pe-rennial famines in arid and semi arid areas.

He said there was no need of building structures alike classrooms and roads alone while the people were dying from famine and starvation.

He said professionals and leaders from drought and famine stricken areas must seek ways to assist famine stricken people.

The priest was speaking at the Good Shepherd Church in Mwingi town when he received food donations from catholic church faithful from Embakasi in Nairobi.

The team led by the chairman of the Christ the King Catholic Church, Embakasi who is also a Nairobi lawyer Mr James Mang’erere.

They donated maize, beans and unga valued at sh200,000 to assist famine stricken families in the Kyuso catholic parish.

Survivors of killer brews regroup to seek safe drink

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URVIVORS of Kenya’s deadly brews have finally found courage to coa-lesce and crusade for a cause.

They have teamed up with a civil so-ci-ety group- Utafiti-, seeking to lobby the government to legalize traditional brews to save Kenyans from illegal killer brews.

Utafiti says it will lobby for the le-gal-ization of the traditional liqour so that consumers do not risk their lives by taking hurriedly prepared lethal stuff.

“We are urging Members of Par-liament to enact a law allowing the return of these brews which Kenyans took with-out any threat to their lives”, said the Utafiti director Mr.John Munuve.

Mr Munuve says consumption of the dangerous substances disguised as li-quor was caused by Government ban of harmless and affordable traditional liquours like muratina, busaa, mnazi among others.

Mr Munuve was speaking during a work-shop for representatives of the vic-tims who lost sight after drinking the substances in Mai Mahiu in Naivasha, Githunguri in Kiambu, Kyumbi in Macha-kos districts and other parts of the country.

He said Utafiti which has so far re-ceived support from the Ford Foun-dation will lobby the Gov-ernment and Members of Par-liament to legalise traditional li-quors as an option to the expensive commercial beer and other liquors.

“At Kshs.100.00,Tusker and other bottled beers are not an alternative for the poor Kenyans who must drink any-way”, said Mr Munuve.

“You cannot prevent citizens from en-joying themselves through liquour. The only option is for the government to allow the affordable and harmless liquors like muratina”, said Mr Munuve.

He cited Tanzania and Uganda where the Government had legalised commer-cial production of traditional liquors and enabled citizens to access affordable brews.

Noting that there many people suffering from effects of drinking dan-gerous substances, Mr Munuve said Utafiti would reach out to them and find ways of assisting them.

He criticised the provincial ad-min-is-tration for exploiting the ban on traditional liquors to enrich them selves.

“ The Provincial administration has made a cash cow out of the trade in illicit liquor.

Last week, the media reported about two chiefs in Emali who fought over a bribe from illicit liquor traders”, said Mr Munuve.

Mr.Munuve urged the media to help in the eradication of the killer brews by exposing administrators “pro-tecting” the brewers for a fee.

He announced that his group will organise workshops for the survivors where experts in different fields will be invited to take them through issues that can turn their lives round.

Ngilu: Why The Hague is best suited for war mongers

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ATER and Irrigation Minister Charity Kaluki Ngilu has spoken out pro-testing the creation of the special court in Kenya to prosecute the post-election violence criminals in the country.

The minister complained that the court is being created for the small people and not for the big ones. Ngilu said that it is the leaders who caused the vio-lence and not by the small people.

She com-plained that jus-tice in the coun-try is being applied selectively and added that the practice must stop. “The small people are not valued in Kenya. The small people must be protected by the law,” the Kitui Central Member of Par-liament and who is also the NARC leader went on to say.

She was speaking at Mililuni village in Tungutu sub-location within her Kitui Central constituency during the burial of 80-year-old Dominic Munyalo Kivenzi. The minister said that the bad governance has ashamed Kenya a lot in the outside world. “Kenya is full of thieves. Everything including the maize and fuel has been stolen. We have the Goldenberg and Anglo-Leasing scan-dals cases among many others. There are many ‘Zakayos’ in Kenya who are not on trees,” Ngilu said. “We must be providing the leadership that we have promised our people. The voiceless and the under-privi-leged in this remain suffering as the result of the bad leadership. Working within the collective re-spon-si-bility, I must voice my concern,” Ngilu added.

She said that Kenyans live by hope and that the God will help them. The bitter Ngilu said that all the stolen public property including the cash can support all Kenyans. She com-plained that the Kenyatta family grabbed all the Coast Province and the Gatundu land and that it (the family ) must surrender that land to the public. “ And such people are seeking the country’s presi-dency, “ Ngilu added.

The minister said that the Kenyans struggled to remove Moi from power from 1992 and they removed him in 2002. “ We ousted Moi from power in 2002. Now has he joined us again. He is now with us,” Ngilu said. She said that it is bad for a leader to fail to give people hope.

Ngilu said that when they took power through the NARC in 2002 they all to-gether with Kibaki agreed not to rig election in any form. Ngilu assured the residents of Kitui District that she is going to ensure that they are provided with sufficient famine relief food during this hunger situation in the area.

She also pledged to serve Kenyans effec-tively and efficiently as the Water and Irrigation Minister. Ngilu pledged to among others sink dams and bore holes for the public. The minister at the same time dismissed as absurdity the so- called ‘ The Kenya We Want’ “ and that is why I did not attend any of those meetings.”

Stalemate ends at Masaku County

Fifth County Clerk takes over after resistance by council boss

ANOTHER transition has taken place at the Masaku County Council.

County Clerk Mr J Kimwele and Treasurer Mr B Mbithi have handed over to new officers about a month after taking over the council from retiring officials Timothy Kamili and Gregory Katiku.

Mr Kimwele took over from Mr Kamili amid a protest led by County Chairman Mr Stanley Man’geli and a group of his councillors. He had not taken full charge of the council as Mr Man’geli frus-trated efforts to have a full transition take place until the min-is-try de-cided to move him to Kiambu Mu-nici-pal Council as Town Clerk.

He was succeeded early February by former Kitui County Deputy Clerk Mr Peter Mutie who had been posted to Garissa as County Clerk. Mutie is now settling to head the council and as we went to press, there were no indications that Mr Man’geli would raise a finger against him- not that he has a choice anyway!. In any case, he is a lawyer and any dalliances with his job will certainly to be en-ter-tained.

What is curious is the fact that Mr Mbithi becomes the fifth person to be appointed Clerk to Council at Masaku County within a year. First, it was Mr Mutemi, followed by Mr Kamili, Mr Macharia, Mr Kimwele and now Mr Mbithi. So who is the problem at Masaku County; is it the Ministry of Local Gov-ernment, the County Clerks or the county council chairman him-self? Only time will tell.

The Anchor established that Mr Mbithi had been relocated to Ol-Kalau as Treasurer, swapping station with the with 49 year old Mr Maina Gathura.

It remains to be seen if the current set of officers at the county is what Mr Man’geli would want to work with. He told The Anchor he had no quarrel with the current pair of officials. A full council session has since endorsed them as signatories of the council’s accounts as required by law.

Moreover, questions are being raised why he is getting jittery over officials posted to work at the county whom he does not know. “Could his actions be influenced by the findings of a report looming large at the council that questions the use of funds at the Kivaa Bus Park within his ward”?, asked a councillor who declined to be named

Man’geli, a second term councillor for Kivaa, now serving for the first time as council boss is now earning the name of a never say die chairman.

Last year, Man’geli stood out like a sore toe to oppose the removal of County Clerk Pius Mutemi, who was replaced by Mr Kamili, with Mr Man’geli causing a stampede as he insisted that Mr Kamili was incapable of leading the council in the right direction while those who know Mr Kamili believed that the veteran local authorities officer was more than capable to offer leadership to Masaku County. Mr Kamili served the Mu-nici-pal Council of Machakos for 20 years as Treasurer and moved to serve with distinction in Kisumu City and Nairobi City in the same capacity before being moved to Masaku County as a count down to his retirement.

The ministry turned down Mr Man’geli’s demands and insisted that Mr Mutemi leaves the county to Malindi after a standoff lasting more than two months, sparking protests from staff.

It was after Mr Kamili settled that the chairman realized that Mr Kamili was of some superior mould. So con-vinced was he that in no time, he marshaled his councillors to make a resolution to the ministry to seek an extension of the tenure of the man he though was incapable of running the county.

When time came for Mr Kamili to leave and the ministry had not responded affirmatively to the coun-cil resolution, Mr Kamili avoided the standoff the chairman was spoiling for and called it a day after handing over to Mr Kimwele, who had been posted from the Mwingi County Council.

Earlier, Man’geli had rejected a Mr Macharia, the man who had been posted to succeed Mr Kamili, before Mr Kimwele was posted.

Kamili’s departure coincided with that of Mr Katiku, whose extension of service the council resolution had also sought. When Mr Mbithi re-ported, Katiku left the office for him without any hand-over notes and was never to return.

When Mr Man’geli realized that the two men had taken over, he made sure they would not deal council business for a day. He led a del-egation of coun-cillors to the Ministry and demanded that they be removed, brandishing a grievance against each of them.

First, he claimed that Mr Kimwele had been rejected at Mwingi, a claim that was false. He also cast aspersions against his integrity- which too could not be supported. The council boss also charged that the new treasurer was related by blood to the fi-nance chairman – Coun-cillor Charles Mutinda and that being the case, the Finance Chairman ought to quit his office to avoid their conniving for what-ever reasons.

But the ministry again said no. So Mr Man’geli decided that they would be frustrated till they left. He declined to hold a full council meeting to have them replace their retired colleagues as signatories. This showdown went on for the whole of January such that the council had to use yet to be known procedure to withdraw Sh 1.9m to pay staff their January salaries. Even then, there were silent protests from them with questions being raised as to why the chairman was blocking bonafide officials from doing their work, causing s delay of the January salary. It was out of the ensuing bad blood that the two officials pleaded with the ministry to be moved.

Civic leaders too were questioning the wisdom, if at all, of the chairman to block officials from working, culminating in a demand for Full Council meeting to discuss the issue, a development that has now been overtaken by events with the de-par-ture of the two.

Observers say that Mr Man’geli has set the stage of a civil war against him ahead of a vote he faces in August that may well define his life as chairman of the County Council of Masaku. Just for how long one man can decide who becomes Clerk to Council may be decided then.

Firm action must be taken to rid

Mavoko of dangerous fraudsters

M

AVOKO Municipal Coun-cil has taken the first ini-tiative to halt haphazard de-vel-opment of Townships in the mu-nici-pality.

A stakeholders forum has just been held at Kyumbi Shopping Cen-tre, an area located within Mavoko Mu-nici-pality to en-gage with stake-holders of the im-por-tance of a well planned township. It is part of the planned the radical reforms in the history of the local au-thority es-tab-lished in 1974.

Due to popu-lation growth and ex-pansion of Nairobi city, more settlements are now diverting to the mu-nici-pality, and are most likely going over to Kitengela and Machakos Mu-nici-pality.

In Mavoko, this expansion is triggering con-flicts in the allo-cation of land which is emerging as the greatest challenge for the mu-nici-pality which covers Athi River town, Mlolongo town and wide ranches owned by senior government offi-cials in the past and current re-gime.

The ownership of huge acres of land by the elite and their failure to develop them has seen competition for the limited resource by investors and private de-vel-opers.

The result is that while there are citizens ready to in-vest in Mavoko, available land, though seemingly idle is owned by some individuals who hold it ideally for specu-lative pur-poses.

Unfortunately for the Municipal Council of Mavoko, it does not own land in trust for the residents that it can use to meet the genuine needs of developers. Cog-ni-zant of this reality, some fraudsters- some of the former officials and leaders of the mu-nici-pality have po-si-tioned themselves in the form of a parallel ‘local authority’, where they sell land belonging to other people. They have also fabricated stamps for Public Health, the Mu-nici-pal Council and mastered the signature of key officials of the mu-nici-pality to generate fraudulent documents that some resi-dents are using to construct houses.

Elsewhere in this issue, we have carried a no-tice and a story about the state of affairs in Mavoko so that residents and developers alike are informed of the dangers lurking in trying to invest in Mavoko.

The good news in this is that the council is fully alive to the challenges this situation is posing and is seemingly on top of things. This means that genuine investors seeking land will certainly get the right information at Town Hall, which they must do before spending a penny.

Ownership issues and the fact that there is pressure from Nairobi to expand into a Metropolis, certainly inform the decisions that the Municipal Council of Mavoko will make in the days to come.

Strategic thinkers know that Mavoko Municipality can no longer be run like a street or a kiosk as has been the case in the past since a wrong or myopic decision taken today will have far reaching consequences in the days to come.

We have no doubt that what appertains in Mavoko today is driven by the axis of corruption that has informed many decisions at the council right from when it was formed as an Urban Council.

As indicated, the good news is that the council seems to un-der-stand the enormity of the emerging challenges in de-vel-oping the mu-nici-pality. It is even encouraging that a District Commissioner has reported in Kathiiani District and it is hoped that the prox-imity of a DC together with other government departments will work hand in hand with the council to ensure that Mavoko is placed at the right place in the development of the Nairobi Metropolis.

Like Machakos, Thika, Kiambu and Kajiado, Kathiani is one of Nairobi’s dormitory towns and councils running the towns within that area, much as are lobbied to play ball with Nairobi City, must ensure that the right decisions are taken at this point in time to correct any messes of the past that have the capacity to make nonsense the development of beautiful satellite cities of Nairobi.

Why MPs would not pass law to

establish an independent tribunal

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t has not come as a surprise that Parliament employed a technicality to block the government’s rush to beat the deadline of enacting a Statute for the Special Tribunal for Kenya and its entrenchment in the Constitution.

As usual any bill that does not go well with politicians, MPs must find a way of blocking it by all means possible. This time it was Mr Gitobu Imanyara (Imenti Central MP, CCU) who led the team to object to fast-tracking discussion on the Statute Bill and Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill, 2009, denying the House a chance to debate them.

Despite the fact that Kisumu is one of the areas where police used live bullets to kill people, among the politicians who supported Mr Imanyara in objecting the bill was Mr John Olago Aluoch (Kisumu Town West MP, ODM). Over 40 people died in Kisumu alone during the first two days of post-election violence.

Other MPs who supported him included Charles Kilonzo (Yatta, ODM-K), Ababu Namwamba (Budalang’i, ODM), and Bonny Khalwale (Ikolomani, New Ford-K) immediately after Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister Martha Karua had sought the House’s permission to reduce the maturity period of the Bills from 14 days to one day. Imanyara objected to the move, saying according to the Standing Order No 98 the House was not ready to grant leave to debate the two Bills.

Even though the International Criminal Court warned that if Kenya does not move fast to act on the Waki report, then it will take over the cases of the names contained in a secret envelope handed to Kofi Annan, Speaker Kenneth Marende referring to Standing Order No 99 supported Imanyara’s move.

Hague prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo had warned that if Kenya failed to try the suspects of post-election violence, then the court will move in to start investigations and prosecute those involved.

He strongly maintained that Kenya had no option but to form a tribunal to investigate and prosecute suspects in the Waki secret envelope handed over to Mr Annan, the former UN secretary-general who was chief mediator in the talks that led to the coalition government, thus temporarily ending the violence.

Although according to Standing Order no 98, a member can object to the House granting leave to speed up a Bill as long as he is supported by at least two members, Members of parliaments were not comfortable to beat the deadline for fear that no one knows whose names are contained into that secret envelop.

According to Waki report it prioritizes the immediate establishment of the Truth and Justice Commission at which those fingered will have opportunity to make confessions and subsequently seek forgiveness. Individuals adversely mentioned would be held accountable for their actions if they fail to voluntarily take the step to confess any misdeeds.

If established, the media will also not escape blame in the report, especially the FM vernacular stations which were accused for fanning tribal animosity. Some religious leaders will also not escape.

Even though no one knows exactly whose names are contained into the secret envelope, while Raila insists that people named in Waki report should face the special tribunal or answer for their alleged crimes at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Agriculture minister, Mr William Ruto ODM) has dismissed the report as “shoddy” and “missing the point by a very big margin”.

Ruto has been joined by his counterpart, Heritage minister William ole Ntimama, (ODM) in criticising sections of the Waki report, saying it targeted members of certain communities in Rift Valley.

If the tribunal had to be established, the big questions would include who were exactly behind the killing, mainly Kikuyu community in Eldoret church?

Who were behind the burning of people, mainly Luo community in Naivasha? What was the role of some politicians in killing? What about some religious leaders, police and Government administrators among others?

People for Peace in Africa (PPA)

P O Box 14877

Nairobi

00800, Westlands

Kenya

Tel 254-20-4441372

E-Mail: ppa@africaonline.co.ke

Website : www.peopleforpeaceafrica.org

Day when ODM-K MPs voted in disagreement with their party leader

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ICE President Kalonzo Musyoka emerged vir-tually alone at the national scene as ODM-K MPs voted on the oppo-site side in arguably one of the most defining moments in Kenya’s history.

In a vote that also humiliated Presi-dent Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga, they watched in total disbelief as MPs scuttled their efforts to establish a local tribunal to prosecute the per-pe-trators of the post-election vio-lence.

MPs Kiema Kilonzo, Charles Kilonzo, Victor Munyaka, J Muoki, Pastor Muoki, Prof Kaloki, Peter Kiilu and Assistant Min-is-ter David Musila, all of ODM-K cast their votes to oppose the Bill while Mr Kalonzo voter for it, marking a major de-par-ture in Kamba Politics. Kangundo’s Johnson Muthama kept off but had ex-pressed his oppo-sition for the bill. Kitui West MP Charles Nyamai also opposed the bill.

Charity Ngilu, Harun Mwau, Gideon Ndambuki and Wavinya Ndeti, all mem-bers of Government voted for the ill fated bill.

It was a clear testimony that Kenyan leaders have lost faith in our justice sys-tems and would rather hand over Kenyans to The Hague than subject them to a local tribunal.

In what was later billed as parliament’s bid to assert its authority against the ex-ecutive, 93 MPs ganged up to ensure that the Bill seeking to es-tab-lish the spe-cial tribunal fails to sail through thereby leaving In-ter-na-tional Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Netherlands as an option.

It was also a day that saw six assis-tant ministers defy directives, threats and in-timi-dation from the government to vote against the the Constitution of Kenya Amendment Bill 2009 that would have created a Special Tribunal for Kenya .

Assistant Ministers Dr Wilfred Machage (Transport), Danson Mungatana (Medical Services), Sospeter Ojaamong (Labour), Calista Mwatela (Education), David Musila (Defence) and George Khaniri (In-for-mation) and joint Government Chief Whip Jakoyo Midiwo voted against the Bill.

Speaker Kenneth Marende ruled that according to Standing Orders 61 that pro-vides if the government gains a ma-jority of votes in a division but does not attain 65pc of members (145) and the opposition’s numbers are above 35pc (77), then the motion is lost.

Since the opposition side garnered 93 votes, it means that the motion is lost. However, the government has the option of re-introducing the Bill after six months.

Quoting the standing order 61 (b) said since those who opposed exceeded the mini-mum 35 percent (77) and therefore could not order repeat of the division within the seven days, he declared the two bills lost.

At the end of the voting, President Kibaki the Vice President and the Pre-mier, looked dejected .

MPs started trooping outside the cham-ber some chanting, The Hague, The Hague, after the speaker directed the next issue in the order paper.

The setting up of the Special Tribunal was one of the far-reaching rec-ommen-dations of the Waki Commission that investigated the poll violence.

Six Cabinet Ministers are among those that could find themselves before the tri-bu-nal, accused of funding the vio-lence. Signals that a local Tribunal would not do justice emerged when the drafters of the bill pro-vided that those indicted would re-main in their offices, rather than step down as their trials went on.

Nairobi Metropolitan Development Min-is-ter Mutula Kilonzo, sensing the House’s mood, proposed that President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga take part in the de-bate.

Mutula spoke after several assistant min-is-ters; Danson Mungatana (Medical Services Assistant Minister), Cecile Mbarire (Tourism), Asman Kamama (Education) and Dr Wilfred Machage (Roads) joined a section of Members of Parliament opposing the Constitution of Kenya (Ammendment) Bill, that seeks to entrench the Tribunal in the Constitution.

Said Mutula: “The President should have been here to move this Bill and the PM to second it since the offences committed relate to them.”

Justice, National Cohesion and Con-sti-tu-tional Affairs Minister Martha Karua got support from Mutula, who said: “The Bills are already the property of this House, 37 million Kenyans and those yet to be born.”

Invoking Section 30 of the Constitution, he said the legislative authority rests with Parliament.

Despite Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka trying to marshal Members of Parliament to support the establishment of a local tribunal to try post-election violence suspects, Members of Parliament from Ukambani who have spoken are against it.

Water and Irrigation Minister Mrs Charity Kaluki Ngilu speaking from her Kitui Central Constituency opposed the local tribunal saying it would be interfered with.

She supported those proposing that the suspects be tried at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague , Netherlands .

Deputy Government Chief Whip and Kangundo MP Johnson Muthama who has spoken inside and outside Parliament supports calls to have the perpetrators of post-election be tried at the ICC. He did not take part in the vote

He says a local tribunal would be abused and no justice would be applied. “The culture of impunity which has taken root in Kenya since independence, 45 years ago, has to come to an end through prosecution of the post-election violence suspects in the Hague“, he stated.

Church member's stinging criticism of AIC Bomani leaders

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IC Bomani leadership has been accused of discrimination and hypocrisy to its membership

In a stinging letter written by a member of the congregation Mr Onesmus Mutua, Pastor Richard Muteto- the care-taker pastor and the elders of the church are reminded that the purpose for which the church exists is spiritual nourishment and not gathering material wealth, which Mr Mutua sees as point of focus for the church. His parting shot is a telling omission on the part of the church where he asks the last time the question: ‘ Who wants to receive Christ’ was posed to the congregation. The letter arises out of a burial where Rev Muteto was to preside over but failed to do so and never offered apologies to the family. The Anchor now presents the letter verbatim. Church sources said the officials were yet to respond to the damning accusations.

“I greet you all in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

As you may be aware, on 7th January 09, a tragedy befell our family. We lost a son (adopted) Master Jacob Musembi Kimeu. Consequently, I informed the Acting Pastor in charge Rev. Richard Muteto. Indeed the matter was announced in church on 11th January 2009. I thank a few of church el-ders who attended meetings at the T-Tot Hotel.

Unfortunately and to the dismay of the family, no pastor/pastor lady or elder vis-ited to pray with the family in the 2 weeks period. In fact, the committee planning the funeral, requested to use the church’s bus.

The response the committee received was to pay Kshs. 20,000/= for hire. The committee took it to mean NO because it was on the higher side. To make matters worse, I per-sonally talked to Rev. Muteto and we agreed that he was to be in charge of the funeral programme. He was duly put on the programme as Pre-siding Min-is-ter. He neither showed up nor did he send apologies. Is this the way to treat church mem-bers?

By the way on Saturday the same church bus was used in a function in which some of the elders were in-volved. They traveled more ki-lo-me-ters at a lesser cost Is this not dis-crimi-nation?

In the last few years, the mem-bership of the church has diminished. The forms which used to be placed on the walk-ways are no longer needed.

The church is nowadays treated as a ‘so-cial welfare club’ be-longing to a few fami-lies. Why does the church exist? What is the mission of the church? Are we em-pha-sizing more on physical de-vel-opment i.e purchasing buses, com-pleting buildings, deco-rating church at the ex-pense of spiritual de-vel-opment? People don’t come to church to listen to announcements about whose son is wedding and whose daugh-ter is fundraising. We come to church for spiri-tual nourishment. The time for the sermon/message has been re-duced to at most 15 min-utes. Announcements and giving for various reasons take the lion share. Why is this so?

By the way, what is the ob-jective of the Welfare Asso-ciation? Why is the church being split into groupings? Those who do not want to register what will happen to them?.

Will they be treated as non-members of the church? Why are we bringing in Welfare Associations to the church? If we have funeral associations out-side, are we converting church to one? This is very dangerous. Let church remain church

Lastly I want to emphasize, that CHURCH IS A PLACE OF WORSHIP. Let us see humility, soberness and understanding from the PASTOR and EL-DERS. We do no want to see chest thumping at the pulpit. When was the last time the question “who wants to receive Christ” was asked in the church.

Let us take the church back to what is was some 15 years ago i.e A place of worship.

May God bless you”.

Boy's brave fight to live as tumours take toll on him

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ix years ago her child complained of pain in the neck and eyes; his eyes were falling and his neck rolling on their own, she took him to a doctor who immediately di-ag-nosed him to be suffering from epi-lep-tic disease.

The doctor prescribed epileptic related drugs and for the next three years young Oscar Musila Mutua got drown with the drugs.

But the doctor was wrong! For all this time that the medical expert un-knowingly put him on the drugs master Mutua had two growing tumors in the brain which had taken toll of his movements and speech.

When the proper diagnosis was finally made it was too late, the young man who for four years of his schooling had known nothing but position one in his terminal examinations was paralysed and con-fined to a wheelchair. His dream of becoming a pilot nipped in the bud!

Today Master Mutua’s classmates in pri-mary school are preparing to join form one. He has remained at home since 2005.

“I remember very well when it all started, in the morning he will complain that his head was rolling on its own, then one Sun-day morning he told me he wanted some soup, I took him to a butchery and after consuming the stuff he started scratching his eyes then he told me he could not see, this took a few minutes, I became concerned”, said his mother Ms Jennifer Ngewa.

“I took him to the Makueni district hos-pi-tal, it was here that he was diagnosed to be suffering from epi-lep-tic, I remember the doctor asking me whether there was a history of the disease in my family, I re-plied in the negative”, she says.

But his condition did not improve despite giving him the doses.

“I would take him back to the hospital com-plaining that the drugs were doing him no good. I got was the prescription of stron-ger tablets”, recalled Ms Ngewa.

“Then one day, I gave him his tooth-brush to brush his teeth, it fell down without him no-ticing, when I asked he replied that his hands were numb, I knew my child was in trouble”.

“He became forgetful and dull, I kept taking him to the same hospital for clinics but they never changed the diagnosis”, she said.

It was then that she took an advice from a friend and took the boy to Kenyatta National Hospital; it was here that a head scan was recommended and the results shocked her.

She was told to take a head scan and she did just that at the MP Shah hospital in Nairobi. “My son had a brain tumour the tests re-vealed”.For Jennifer Ngewa, an employee at the Min-is-try of Lands and Settlements in Macha-kos the revelation shocked her and left her in a state of shock that she is yet to get out of.

She believes that the tribulations her only child is undergoing could have been arrested at the early stages if proper di-ag-no-sis was made.

“For all that time that we pumped him with epileptic drugs, the tumour grew larger and larger and took toll of my son’s body mecha-nisms”.

“I feel bad that we pumped him with drugs that he did not need, the drugs were strong and made him weak and drowsy most of the time, I wish the doctor had made the correct diagnosis maybe we could have treated the problem early enough to our sat-is-faction”, says Ms Ngewa.

For six years now, Mrs Ngewa has been forced to change her lifestyle and to be with her child.

“My weekday is shared between my work and taking care of my child who is ‘per-ma-nently’ bedridden”, she said.

When we visted his house at the Public Works government quarters Ms Ngewa was spoon feeding her son.

“He cannot eat on his own, his hands are powerless, he can’t engage himself in a dis-cussion but make efforts to speak say by struggling to call my name when in need”.

“I still have this feeling that he will get out of it, go back to school and pick up from where he stopped. Who knows he may not be late for his dream of becoming a pilot”, said Ms Ngewa.

Today master Mutua is celebrating his 14th birthday. His healing process has been slow and at times painful.

He underwent two operations at different in-ter-vals to remove the tumours in 2007. “Doctors had mercy on the boy’s case and reduced the charges to Sh 300,000|.

Unfortunately as he was in the process of re-cov-ering a tumour recurred and it knocked him down hence his current state.

“It was followed by a strong attack of malaria that saw him first admitted to Bishop Kioko hospital in Machakos be-fore he was trans-ferred to Kenyatta National hospital”.

Ms Ngewa has refused to have sympathy stand in her way,” pity makes one to lose control, it makes one think of giving up, I am de-ter-mined to help Oscar start his life a fresh”, she said.

“Life has taught me to appreciate things the way they come, when my son was admitted at Kenyatta hospital I shared the same ward with him, to take care of him, but I saw many cases of that nature some were worse and I ended up pitting those cases forgetting my case briefly”, she said.

The prize of helping her son recover is turning costly for the single mother. Her civil service salary for a clerical officer the position she holds just can’t match the requirement that her son’s current ailment requires.

“Physiotherapy is expensive, he needs to be carried to the hospital every time I take him there, and recently I decided to be inviting a physiotherapist at home at a cost of Sh 400 per each visit”.

With the prohibitive costs she calls him during the month end when her em-ployer pays her salary.

“I have learnt from the physiotherapist a few tricks so in the absence I apply them just to keep the cost down”, she said.

Despite her meager salary Ms Ngewa is putting everything at her disposal to help her fight to the end in ensuring that her only child gets back to the life he was used to.

She is full of praise for friends who visit her child at home in her absence to wash, dress up and to feed Oscar.

“They have been my source of in-spi-ration, they are my work mates and friends who have channel the little they have to help Oscar re-cover, I must thank Kyethivo girls high school principal Ms Justina Ndanu Kiteme she has always availed her car to take my son to hospital for clinics any-time a need occurs”.

Ms Ngewa said she has sold most of her prop-erty including land to cater for her child’s need.

Now she requires more than Sh 500,000 for the third operation to remove the tu-mour. A top surgeon in the region said the con-dition of the boy could not have been worse if a proper diagnosis was made when he first vis-ited a doctor.

The medic speaking on condition of ano-nymity said tumours if detected early can make a patient to lead a ‘very nor-mal life’.

“In this case the boy’s body system was de-stroyed through drugs he did not need in the first place, three years on strong epi-lep-tic drugs when a tumour is growing unchecked was the worst mistake to have befallen him”, he said.

Kavutha seeks

local jobs

for youth

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he Government has been asked to employ wananchi in roads and other Government funded projects as a means to assist them access in-comes to fight hunger and famine.

The immediate former Makueni county council chairman Mr Joseph Kavutha said in addition to providing famine relief food, the Gov-ernment could utilise the unemployed in rural areas to work on road construction projects under the su-per-vision of District Roads Engineers.

He said such an approach would help the Government to carry out its at a lower cost and at the same time alle-viate the effects of famine and drought.

He said devolved funds like CDF, LATF and other Gov-ernment sponsored projects in diverse sectors could tap on the idle man-power in most famine stricken areas like Ukambani and help raise the people’s incomes.

Kavutha hailed the initiative by Kamba MPs to assist famine stricken people dubbed “ Kuthuuia Mukamba”. He challenged them to think beyond and lobby the government, NGOs and other development agencies to dam rivers to enable the population reach food sufficiency in the region through irri-gation.

Kitui leaders issue ultimatum to contractors

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HE contractor building the 45-kilometre Kangonde-Kitui highway at a cost of 1.3 billion shillings has a three-month ultimatum to complete the con-struction work.

The altimatum was issued by the Kitui District Leaders during their District Roads Committee Meeting that was chaired at the Kitui District Roads Engineer’s office by the Kitui County Council chairman John Mang’uye.

The leaders included Members of Par-liament Julius Kiema Kilonzo (Kitui East) and Charles Mutisya Nyamai (Kitui West) and the District Commissioner Joshua K.Chepchieng.

Kitui Central MP Charity Kaluki Ngilu and who is also the Water and Irrigation Min-is-ter did not attend the meeting with an apology. The minister is in Madrid, Spain on an official tour. They vowed that failure to have the Contractor finish the work within the three months, they will have no al-ter-native other than chasing him away. The com-plained that they can never

Accept the public funds to be wasted for nothing. The controversial contractor has been con-structing the highway since May 2006. “It is very clear that we want the tarmacking of the Kangonde-Kitui high-way to be finished as soon as possible.

They further wanted the contractor who is recarpeting the 75-kilometre Masii-Kitui road at a cost of 800,000 million shillings to work expeditiously. They said that the recarpeting work had in the past taken so long but the contractor tripled the speed after being cautioned by the ministry’s Chief Roads Engineer.

“There is need for the contractor to speed up further,” the leaders said. They also emphasized as their priority the tarmacking of the 91-kilometre Kitui-Kibwezi highway.

They said that they are looking for funding to improve the 6-kilometre Ngai Ndethye section of the 41-kilometre Kyoongwe-Sombe road in the district. They regretted that the plight of the road’s section was very critical and added that situation had deteriorated. Others attending the meeting included the Kitui District Roads Engineer Benson M.Masila and the Dis-trict Roads Officer Joseph R. Warutere.

KNUT branch sinks deeper into debt as

it mortgages its building for Ksh30 million

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he Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) Machakos Branch is set to sink deeper into debt following the mort-gaging of it building for Sh 30 million, the Anchor reveals.

It will now owe banks and teachers a whooping Sh 73m and it remains to be seen if ever it will rise to over-come the effects of years of mismanagement. The loan amount is to be used to resuscitate the edu-cation scheme from the death bed

Our investigations say the once vi-brant Education Scheme is owed to the tune of Sh 43 million and its account is running at an overdraft of Sh 3m, with running costs escalating to Sh 400,000 every month.

685 teachers who believe that looting and mismanagement is the order of the day at the scheme have withdrawn from the kitty and owe the scheme Sh 24,055,792.00 in refunds.

Another 303 members who have re-tired, many of whom who failed to get loans during their service from the scheme, are demanding a total of Sh 12,524,168.000 from the Knut.

Relatives of some 36 other members who are dead are demanding another Sh 1,267,681.50 from the Knut Branch, bringing the total debt owed to Sh 37,846,641.50.

Our sources at Knut say the bank account that operates the scheme run dry some years ago and is running on an over draft of Sh 3,007,888.45, with an expenditure outlay of some Sh 2,996,389.00.

These stark realities are emerging as three new Knut branches created from Macha-kos recently are demanding the sharing of assets.

Teachers say that the state of affairs arises from poor supervision of their in-vestments by their Knut branch lead-ership.

The Education scheme is a voluntary con-tributory fund where teachers con-trib-ute cash monthly on check off sys-tem as a savings plan to assist their families pay school fees. They obtain loans that are twice the number of a member’s shares.

TSC deducts monthly dues from Members and recovers re-payments and remits the cash to Knut, an arrangement that makes the scheme a very liquid and easy to manage out-fit. Millions of shillings are deducted ev-ery month on check off system and teachers have benefited over the years from the be-nevo-lence brought about by the scheme.

It is a success story in other parts of the country, yet it is a source of suffering today in Machakos The mortgage comes as a group of retired teachers have gone to court, claiming ownership of the house after allegedly buying it from its Asian owners.

Details available to us show that the plot- Machakos Municipality Block 1/57 has a charge in favour of IDB Capital Limited “to secure a sum of Kshs.30, 000,000”.

The details, contained in a Certificate of Official Search, show the charge was done on December 1, 2008.

The land, with an Annual Rent Charge of Sh 7,000 is under a 99 year lease from December 1 1952. On November 14, 2008, KNUT branch Board of Trustees was registered as Trustees of the plot. On November 27, 2008, a Certificate of lease was issued. The search was conducted on February 2, 2009 by one Francis K. Mainga.

Mainga, who gave his address as 84, Sultan Hamud, explains in the cer-tifi-cate that he was seeking the search for purpose of giving evidence in court concerning a case on the plot.

Sources who know the story indicate that the disclosure of the charge was made to a joint meeting of the Macha-kos, Mwala, Kangundo, Mwala and Yatta districts executive committees that is seeking to share assets of the former Machakos Knut branch before it was split.

Kangundo CDF faces probe

as Sh4 Million go missing

A team of auditors is due to probe fi-nances at the Kangundo constituency de-vel-opment fund to es-tab-lish the where-abouts of Sh 4million that is alleged to have dis-appeared.

A source from the office said the auditors who are expected any time from next week were prompted by a complaint letter to the CDF office in Nairobi after the said amount failed to be accounted for .

The source further said that the missing money was part of the Sh54million the con-stituency received for the year 2008.

The money is said to have disappeared between the Machakos and the Nairobi offices which are charged with the re-spon-si-bility of releasing and allo-cating transactions of the money according to a member of the Kangundo CDF committee.

As a result, the intended projects have collapsed, raising a lot of public outcry.

In the ensuing event, two staff mem-bers in the CDF office are said to have been send on compulsory leave pending the investigations.

Meanwhile, similar problems are also being cited at the Yatta CDF office where some sh4million set aside for education bursary is said to have not reached their designations.

According to the beneficiaries of the money who are university, colleges and secondary school students, the money is said to have failed to reach the in-sti-tutions even after they filled appli-cation forms for the same since September last year.

‘’We were even issued with covering offi-cial letters from the office to take to our in-sti-tutions indicating the money would have reached them before December last year’’ said a university student.

But when the students reported for this year’s first term, they were shocked af-ter being turned back home since the money never reached the in-sti-tutions.

The CDF chairman Mr Gregory Mulwa, said the problem was attributed by the treasury’s delay to release the money in time. He however, said they were still pur-suing the issue exonerating his office from the blame.

Kibwezi villagers feed on wild fruits to beat famine

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ESIDENTS of a remote village in Kibwezi district have resulted to feeding on wild fruits and raw man-goes as hunger spreads in the area.

Desperate villagers in Kisingo sub lo-cation of Makindu division are lining up at stra-te-gic areas to beg for food from pass-ersby.

Elderly women, men and children have found philanthrophic Nairobi based In-di-ans who harvest stones in the area and who offer them food.

As we interviewed a group of frail looking women who claimed they had not put anything on the table for a couple of days,a four wheel drive pajero appeared and hell broke loose.

“Niwooka,Niwooka (he has come, he has come),shouted a section of school going children who had accompanied by the grannies.

The vehicle stopped and Mr.Vaghji Kerai of the Indian Community Association alighted armed with a packet of Ikg maize flour for the elderly and mangoes and bis-cuits for the chidren. Mr,Kerai who crashes stones in the area said he was touched by the plight of the starving residents considering the area has not received rains fro several seasons now.

“We felt disturbed by their plight and came together to help them with the little we can afford to find from our-selves and friends”, he said as he moved to another waiting group a short distance away.

In order to help them out of the famine predicament, Mr.Kerai and his friends have invested in building earth dams for the residents to enable them engage in small scale irrigation farming.

He is disturbed that the residents have destroyed the environment by felling trees for charcoal burning as their source of in-come.

Mr.Kerai who is also the managing Di-rector of Hi-Tech Granite Industries termed the food situation in Makindu division as threat-ening.

90 year old Nzui Kisilu says the last time she saw a grain of relief food was last December which was distributed to se-lected few by the World Vision.Residents said government relief food has not been seen “yet we hear so much has been sent”.

And as death stares at thousands in Ukambani, local leaders are appealing to the international community to chip in to avert a catastrophe.

“The situation is so severe that we may soon start loosing lives to the biting hun-ger”, said cabinet minister Mutula Kilonzo.

Mutula has appealed for relief through his starving constituents through his Mwaki (builder) Foundation. He has written the chairman of East Af-ri-can Satsang Swaminarayan Temple asking them to help in whatever manner recalling that the area has not rained for four years now.

The Nairobi Metropolitan Development minister has also written to the Office of The President who have pledged to help.

According to a letter in response to his plea, the PS has directed the Managing Director National Produce and Board to send 4000 bags of maize, vegetable oil and unimix flour to the district commissioners fro Mbooni East and Mbooni West. In Makueni district, more than 300,000 people are in dire need of urgent relief food supplies as the biting famine con-tinue to ravage the area.

Makueni MP Peter Kiilu says the most affected areas in his constituency area Kitise,Kithuki,Kathonzweni and Nguu where drought has pitched tent for years now.

It’s your job on the line, Kitui DC tells chiefs

KITUI District Commissioner Joshua K.Chepchieng is warning local chiefs and their assistants against stealing famine relief supplies. He warned them that any chief who will steal even one spoonful of that food will be pun-ished mer-cilessly.

The DC directed them to visit home-steads, schools and markets to assess the hun-ger situation on the ground. “If anybody starves to death in your area, you will be responsible for that death. Do provide the government with the hunger related in-for-mation for us to see where we can assist,” Chepchieng told the chiefs. He was addressing the local District Officers, chiefs and their assistants during a meeting a meeting he had convened at the Kitui Multi-purpose Development Training Institute.

He was accompanied by his deputy Fredrick Kiteme and the District Administratio Police Commander SSP Abdullahi K.Adan.The DC disclosed that the district has a population of about 500,000 people and added that about 70 percent of the population live below pov-erty line.

He said that the government is currently feeding a total of 290,000 people through famine relief food. He instructed chiefs to distribute the food to the people imme-di-ately after they receive it .”We want you to distribute the food to the people on the same day you receive it or the following day.

The food should not be kept in the store while people are hungry. The food comes to you and you receive it as the chief and you have to distribute it to the people imme-di-ately,” Chepchieng said. “We want you to be very open. We have firm in-structions on this. If you tamper with the relief food in any way, the police will be forced to climb on you,” the DC told the chiefs.

He said that if they serve the public well, they will have no problem with anybody. Chepchieng said that he wanted the food distribution to be done with accountabil-ity. “You may want to please everybody but may end up in displeasing everybody,” the DC added. He told the chiefs to imme-di-ately bring to his office any in-for-mation about hunger situation saying that his office must send daily report on the issue to Nairobi . He said that the dis-trict has lacked suffi-cient rainfall for the last four consecutive years.

The DC anno said he had rec-ommended promotions for the good officers (the chiefs) in the district. “We have also rec-ommended the opposite of pro-motion for the unproductive officers,” he added. The DC had earlier in the day flagged off from his office compound five Kenya Red Cross Society lorries carrying some 55.3 tonnes of foodstuff worth thousands of shillings donated to the larger Kitui Dis-trict by the Kenya Red Cross Society, the Nakumatt Su-per-mar-kets Limited and the national media houses. The foodstuff in-cludes maize flour, cooking oils, wheat flour, beans and green-grams. The Kenya Red Cross Society’s special programmes manager Abdishakur Othowai spoke on behalf of the donors as they donated the foodstuff to the DC.

And the DC thanked them for the ges-ture. Kitui District received 40.1 tonnes of the donations with the other 15.2 tonnes going to Mutomo District. Chepchieng then accom-pa-nied the donors in transporting the 40.1 tonnes foodstuff to Katulani lo-cation ( Katulani division), Sombe lo-cation ( Mutitu division) and Kanyangi location ( Yatta location). Othowai dis-closed that they gave the lager Kitui district 55.3 tonnes of the 172 tonnes they have collected in Nairobi towards assisting the hungry in the country. Present in-cluded the Kenya Red Cross Society Kitui branch chairman Davies Mulinge Mwongela and the branch coordinator Augustine Kisui.

Depot manager charged over

theft of relief food in Emali

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National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB) depot manager has been charged in Makueni court with the theft of famine relief food.

Emali NCPB depot manager Nancy Wawira Njeru appeared before Makueni principal magistrate Frida Nyakundi accused of stealing 130 bags of maize.

Charged along her was a board em-ployee, Alexina Nambuche who were both accused of committing the offence on January 31, 2009 at the depot in Emali. They both denied the charge and were each released on a Sh 100,000 bond with surety of similar amount.

Prosecuting, Chief Inspector Peter Katumo told the court that the maize was valued at Sh 238,550, the prop-erty of the government of Kenya.

The same court also issued arrest warrants for three others who failed to appear in court to answer similar charges. They had been arrested and released on free police bonds but or-dered to appear in court to take plea.

Meanwhile, business at Emali town, Mulala division in Nzaui district was temporarily interrupted for the better part of the day as thousands of starved wananchi demontrated along the streets against alleged sale of famine relief food by provincial ad-min-is-trators in both Makueni and Nzaui district. Led by 11 civic leaders from Makueni county council, local and religious leaders the demonstrators demanded the removal of the ad-min-is-trators.

They gave the government seven days to take action on the officers for their alleged role in the dis-appearance of famine relief food from Emali National cereal and produce board depot.

Earlier, a lorry bearing a Rift Valley miller’s address was intercepted by Sultan Hamud police officers as it trans-ported 130 bags of maize from Emali NCPB depot heading to a fictitious “Mueni village in W.ward”. Addressing the demonstrators, Coun-cillor Francis Mutuku called on President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga to order thorough in-ves-ti-gation on the famine relief scan-dal in the two districts.

They said that a cartel involving se-nior government officials, the depot man-agement and unscrupulous business people had been removing relief food from the stores under fic-titious destinations to line their pockets at the expense of fam-ished residents.

Terming the scandal as the height of impunity councillor Mutuku said it was “sheer insolence that this is happening when the president had declared the famine a national di-sas-ter and appealed for in-ter-na-tional intervention”.

MYWO boss wants women to share out relief food

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achakos Maendeleo ya Wanawake Or-ga-ni-zation branch chairman Mrs Mary Muting’a wants women organisations to he given the role of distributing fam-ine relief.

Mrs. Muting’a claimed women knew better the problems afflicting other women in the village.

She said such a move would re-duce in-ci-dences of gov-ernment officials selling fam-ine re-lief food as has been re-ported in various parts of Ukambani- although that con-tention is debatable given the fact that some women organisations- in-cluding her own Maendeleo Ya Wanawake have been fingered for lacking in probity in the man-agement of public resources.

A probe at the Masaku County Council is ques-tioning a project running into over Sh 1m where Maendeleo was to carry out tree planting, was advanced some huge sums, yet nothing can been seen to account for the cash.

Mrs Mutinga said the Gov-ernment should ensure the banks charged with the re-spon-si-bility of disbursing Women En-ter-prise Fund do not levy huge fees from borrowers.

She said that the process of accessing loans from the banks resulted in huge levies that heavily ate into the borrowed sums.

Questions as Machakos endures new rule to pay for parking in CBD

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esidents of Machakos municipality are de-manding efficient services from the local authority that are commen-su-rate with the taxes they are paying.

A meeting between council officials led by the Mayor of Machakos Mr. Fidelis Kimuyu and the residents and other stake-holders under the Macha-kos Business and Property Owners Asso-ciation remained stormy as resi-dents demanded explanations on actions by the council.

The mayor, flunked by the town clerk Mr. Stephen Mbondo spent time ex-plaining actions of the council and usage of funds allocated to the local authority under the Local Authority Trust Fund (LATF) and rev-enue collected locally.

Leaders of the Association -Busi-nessmen Tito Musyoka(Chairman), Bahati Mutua( Sec-re-tary) and Peter Kamba (Trea-surer) had called the meetings ostensibly to seek explanation over a new taxation regime that requires mo-torists to pay parking fees among others and a tree planting ex-er-cise currently taking place in the streets.

Business owners claim the tree planting is being done without due consideration as some of the trees are planted in front of shop doors, making loading a big head-ache to traders.

The council has introduced parking fees of Sh 50 per car per day to all motorists as part of its programme on enhancing revenue collection to meet performance contracts and at the same time de-con-gest the CBD.

It was gazetted last year but was in-tro-duced in January 2009- and resi-dents are alleging that they were never in-formed of the plan at its in-ception, a claim the council denies.

The issue was first raised in similar meeting of the Machakos Chamber f Commerce and In-dus-try that was chaired by the Chairman Mr Paul Mbole, where no council officials turned up to face the traders present. Council offi-cials say though they waived fees for use of its Social Hall for the Chamber meeting, its officials were never invited for the meeting- as opposed t the one by the Association where invitations were made to the Town Fathers.

Chamber officials deliberately skipped the Association’s meeting as they ques-tioned what issues the association was raising that had not been raised at the chamber meeting, held two weeks earlier and was also boy-cotted by Association leaders.

It is difficult to exactly say what was reached at during the two meetings- al-though both groups went home gratified that they had vented over issues that they feels are trou-bling the growth of their businesses. Weeks after the Parking Fees rule took root, the town is largely decongested. Motorists used to parking in the CDB and taking matatus to the city now leave their cars at home and those who had aban-doned their un-ser-viceable cars on the streets have towed them away after the council gave them no-tices to remove them.

Mr Mbondo told our writers that the coun-cil was collecting an average of Sh 10,000 from parking fees. He said the council will mark the parking slots and develop parking infrastructure so as to perfect its collection.

Residents are concerned on quality of work carried out on council projects and are de-manding that qualified contractors be given the jobs However in defense of the council, the mayor said that tenders for main-te-nance of roads were awarded and supervised by the Kenya roads Authority which has its own engineers and auditors rendering the local au-thority impotent in ensuring good workmanship.

Saying that the procurement and dis-posal Act, prohibits, councillors from being in the ten-der committee, the mayor said the law had com-pro-mised their supervisory role in comple-men-tation of projects funded un-der LATF or the central government.

The council also came under heavy criticism on its ambitious tree planting projects in the town, where trees have been planted on the doors of business pre-mises disregarding parking, loading and off loading bays.

Despite the acrimony which char-ac-terized much of the deliberations the combative resi-dents however lauded the council for its on-going streets lighting project es-pe-cially in the slum areas, which they said had greatly curbed insecurity.

Already, the Konza Road has been lit while poles have been erected along Kitui Road, Kangundo Road and along Mwatu wa Ngoma Streets and could be connected with elec-tricity in coming days in a Eu-ro-pean Union Funded project that will give Machakos a major face lift.

Kathiani DC: Why a row is a must

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athiiani District Commissioner Lawford Kibaara has reported in Athi River, a day after vote was taken to locate the head-quar-ters of the newly created Kathiani district at Athi River Town.

Out of 18 civic leaders from the district, 12 voted for Athi River, two for Mitaboni while three who were proponents of Kathiani abstained while a fourth walked away in protest before the decisive vote.

The acrimonious meeting was chaired by Machakos Dc Mr Bernard Kinyua at the DC’s boardroom and was also attended by area MP and Sports assis-tant minister Wavinya Ndeti who took a neutral po-sition and did not vote.

11 civic leaders from Mavoko mu-nici-pal council that covers Athi river town voted for Athi River while one from Kathiani voted with them.

The DC who initially opposed a vote in favour of consensus was finally forced to take the vote when the meeting almost reached a deadlock and the proponents of Kathiiani refused to back down.

Those in favour of Athi River said the es-tab-lishment of the headquarters there would help to stop further encroachment of vital economic features of the district by Nairobi City.

Civic leaders favouring Kathiani town said the presence of the DC would boost de-vel-opment in the area noting that it had adequate facilities to accommodate the headquarters and bring services closer to the rural poor. Moreover, they said, Kathiiani had served as the traditional head-quar-ters of the con-stituency, hence the DC ought to be based there.

MP Wavinya Ndeti said that if the district headquarters was established in Athi River, she would push for rural based de-partments like ag-ri-cul-ture to be based at Kathiani while at the same time push for the posting of another District Commissioner in Kathiiani.

Later, civic and other leaders from Kathiani addressed a press con-ference to oppose the decision, and questioned the mandate of the civic leaders in taking a vote to decide where the DC would be based.

They said the decision of the head-quar-ters was too vital to be left to civic leaders alone without con-sul-tation of other commu-nity leaders.

They said they would go to court to stop the decision or rather remain in the current Machakos district instead of going to Athi River.

Observers see the development as being as divisive as ever because each of the players eeem unwilling to con-sider factors raised by those f the opposite side.

For instance, Kathiiani proponents say it would be meaningless and costly for one to by-pass the Machakos DC while going to Athi-River to see the DC, which sounds valid. But those supporting Mavoko ar-gued that they would rather deal with the DC in Machakos rather than by pass him to seek same services in Kathiiani.

These arguments, petty as they may be expose historical blunders that were committed by leaders who contemplated the boundary of the present day Kathiiani Constituency, where they used retired logic to create a constituency in the shape of a half moon, curving around Machakos Town Constituency to address political issues rather than issues of population, geo-graphical factors and practical lo-gis-tics.

That being the case, there can never be a justification to have either Mavoko or Kathiiani market without a District Commissioner- because stationing a DC in either and ignoring the other would be ill advised.

Proponents of new districts say that they are aimed at bringing government ser-vices closer to the people. But positioning a DC in either Mavoko or Kathiiani may not ful-fill that objective for local residents as some would be traveling longer distances than is the case now to see their DC, who is based in Machakos.

Be that as it may, the objective remains popular and it that is the real motive then it must be seen to be so in practice. That is why the decision to place in DC in Mavoko may annoy some- and some-thing must be done to address the concerns that those dissatisfied are rising.

Earlier, residents of Kathiiani Township demonstrated to demand the es-tab-lishment of the district head-quar-ters in the area.

Led by several civic leaders among them councillors Judah Mutua and Alphonce Wambua, the residents opposed the es-tab-lishment of the district head-quar-ters at Athi River town.

They asked the Government and Ms Ndeti to seek the wishes of the majority of the public before deciding where to lo-cate the district headquarters.

The residents said the town was most suited for the headquarters because it had over 15 acres of Government land to accommo-date Government offices. in addition to other fully fledged Gov-ernment institutions to support the headquarters.

They said that most social amenities and office space were available that included the district hospital, a good road net-work, water supply noting that the town was the traditional headquarters of the con-stituency turned district.

Kathiani district was curved off Macha-kos district in December 2008 when the Gov-ernment also created a Mbooni East and West districts to resolve a bitter and long standing dispute over the district head-quar-ters.

The Kathiani dispute has since drawn resi-dents of Kathiani and Mitaboni townships as well as Athi River town into a tussle over the district headquarters.

Two weeks ago residents of Mitaboni staged a similar demonstration to press for the establishment of the head-quar-ters there where they argued was central while Kathiani and Athi River lay to the Eastern and Western extremes respectively.

Boost for Kangundo women as tourists come calling

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ore than 100 women curio dealers in Kangundo district got a boost when a team of tourists from six foreign coun-tries vis-ited the area and bought a variety of the commodities.

The more than 100 tourists led by four am-bassa-dors came from Poland, Co-lom-bia, Venezuela, Ireland, Ma-lay-sia and Thailand. The curio exhibition was held at a free ground provided by the Kangundo Mp Johnstone Muthama, who had mobilised the women for the rare occasion damped the ‘’Ist Kangundo Women Em-pow-erment Forum and Trade Show’’. It was a show of might and influence for Mr Muthama as such a retinue of dip-lo-mats can not come just for nothing. According to Mr Muthama, who actually sourced the tourists to the area, the aim of the forum was to empower the locals in a bid to get rid of the culture of begging within the community.

“Yes mine was to ensure I empower my people to be self dependant other then to always engage in the habit of begging’’ he said adding that this was just the start of things as the event would now be annual. Among the ambassadors present in-cluded M/s Ann Grupinska (Poland),Mrs M.V De Suarez(Colombia), Mrs Jackline Nendoza(Venezuela) and the Ist sec-re-tary in the Thailand em-bassy Mr Preeyapa Stitaragu.

Goods that comprised kiondos, or-naments, gourds and wood carvings valued at nearly Sh2million was dis-posed to the tourists. The women who comprised members of women self help groups praised the move saying it had improved the area’s economy especially at this time of a famine di-sas-ter.

However, a section of the women ex-pressed their dissatisfaction in the manner the trade show was conducted arguing that many of the beneficiaries were outsiders. “Most of us did not have chance to sell even a single item since our market was exploited by people from Nairobi who were sneaked into the show by po-litically well connected people with the MP’’ said the angry women. They wondered why the MP organised such a good forum yet allowed outsiders to exploit them.

‘’In future we might not attend the fo-rum until proper measures are put into place to rid off the exploiters’’ they said. The ambassadors said the trade ex-hi-bition between the women and the tourists would strengthen both economic and tourism ties between Kenya and their coun-tries.

They pledged to make a come back praising the MP for providing his con-stitu-ents with nets to fish other than relying on giving them the fish.

On politics, Mr Muthama defended the move to have the suspects in the Waki report on post election violence be tried in Hague. “Kenya is not the first country to take such culprits to the international court so there is no cause for the alarm, let them go there and prove their innocence’’ said the MP.

On the finance committee bill on the grand regency hotel sale, he said “the report was biased as it did not include some big names of suspects and that’s why we scuttled it”.

On fire disasters, the MP blamed the vice to what he termed as total failure in lead-ership over awareness precautions.

Narrow escape for Ex manager at Kyanzavi Co-op society

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ore than 300 workers at the Kyanzavi coffee farmers com-pany Ltd in Kangundo staged a day long protest aganist the return of a former manager to the com-pany.

The angry workers held hostage the manager for more than four hours threatening to lynch him and torch his car him before he was later rescued by the company’s directors.

Efforts by both the police from Kangundo and Group four se-cu-rity guards from Thika to rescue the manager were fruitless as the company’s security guards re-fused to open the gate to the workshop where the manager was held.

The manager was said to have been transferred out of the com-pany some time last year for several reasons but made a sur-prise come without the knowl-edge of the workers nor that of the directors. On seeing him, the workers aban-doned their duties and set the farm alarm on attracting all their colleagues from the coffee farms.

On arrival at the factory, the workers demanded to know who had authorized the man-ager to the company compound after he had been transferred and re-placed with another.

But in the ensuing scuffle, the manager who could not exactly explain himself to the workers called his Thika head office as well as the Kangundo police on phone that arrived immediately for his rescue but all in vain.

The guards at the gate stood firm and refused the police entry to the factory where the manager was being held. After a heated ex-change with the police, the com-pany guards called the company’s chairman on phone who at the time was in Nairobi with other directors attending to a court matter.

In his response, the chairman Mr. James Muema, told the guards to ensure the manager was not harmed but keep him until he arrives after which in an hour’s time he arrived with his board of directors.

He Talked to the both the police and the guards and assured them that the manager would be safe hence urging them to leave the matter with his office. The se-cu-rity detail later left leaving the manager behind. The directors held a closed door meeting with the former man-ager where they resolved that he should leave the com-pound with immediate effect and never make a come back.

As he was escorted outside the compound, angry workers carrying twigs hurled insults to him accusing him of being re-spon-sible of their many prob-lems they have been facing that included salary delay among others things.

The chairman later addressed the workers who agreed to re-turn to work. “As a board of directors we also feel concerned on how the man-ager decided to come to our factory yet he had ceased working for us’’ said the chairman.

The chairman said along with the workers grievances, the former manager has been colluding with some former directors to un-der-mine the current man-agement.

He said already his board had written to the Tropical Farm Man-agement Agency, managing director, the manager’s em-ployer, informing them of their(Board) concerns. But even after ceasing to work for our company, he has from time to time been sneaking into the company’s farms for business unknown to us’’ said the chairman adding that this amounted to trespassing that he should be prosecuted for.

KWS captures reptile

enya Wildlife Service (KWS) rangers have come to the rescue of Kiu residents by capturing a12 feet python.

The reptile has been terroriz-ing villagers in Kiu area of Nzaui Dis-trict by feasting on their goats and traversing menacingly all-over the village.

Machakos and Makueni District Game Warden Mr. Julius Manza said that the serpent had swallowed a goat the previous day and was feared it might cause more havoc in the area.

The reptile slithered into the village two weeks ago from an unknown destination and is be-lieved to have been escaping the vagaries of bad weather and was seeking ‘greener pastures’ to survive.

All eyes on ACK prelate as

Kitui community library closes

Boniface Mulu

THE Kitui Community Li-brary and Resource Centre has been closed by the landlords after the library’s management failed to pay Sh 40,000 rent for the last five months.

Librarian Mr. Gideon Mukula, made a passionate appeal to well-wishers to come to the aid of the library. The building is owned by the Kitui Tobacco Growers Co-op-erative Society Lim-ited. Mukula re-gretted that the li-brary was facing very acute financial prob-lems.

He said that they pay the land-lords 8,000 shillings for rent per month and that they had failed to pay the rent from Sep-tem-ber last year up to January 2009. “We are in dire need for the financial support to be able to run the li-brary.

The running of it is not for a church or an individual. All people are in-volved in running it in one way or the other,” the librarian said. Mukula was speaking at the li-brary when the library’s man-agement committee offi-cials met to discuss the prob-lems affecting the library.

The man-agement committee offi-cials announced that they will con-duct a fundraiser in aid of the library on March 14, 2009. Mukula asked the management committee offi-cials to avoid lateness and absentism during their meetings.

The librarian fur-ther sym-pa-thized with the vol-un-teer workers at the library and he appealed to the well-wishers to remember them (the vol-un-teers) for survival. Other speakers in-cluded the li-brary chairman Reverend Silvester Kiema and secretary Jemimmah Musangi Mbiti. The li-brary pa-tron, Arch-bishop Ben-jamin Mwanzia Nzimbi, was absent with an apology. All eyes now will be fo-cused on Arch-Bishop Nzimbi, the head of the Anglican Church of Kenya to show leadership in this respect.

The predicament of the Commu-nity Library is one f the challenges faced by community initiatives in many parts of the country. Libraries are very rare initiatives in rural areas and if the Kitui initiative dies, gone will be the benefit that reading brings about to an individual in par-ticu-lar and the community in general.

Insecurity as three are murdered in Misakwani

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N-SE-CU-RITY is reaching alarming rates in areas around Macha-kos town following the grisly mur-der of three people in one month.

In one incident a man’s geni-tals, eyes, tongue and arm were stolen and was buried by anguished relatives who be-lieve that they were taken to perform anti-people rituals.

The man, popularly known as “Fala” and was a regular seller of logs of trees suffered severe injuries and was found dumped near the Misakwani Assistant chief James Kombo’s office in Mukalala area of Misakwani sub-location in the out-skirts of Machakos town.

Area councillor Benson Muasa who is also the Machakos Deputy Mayor made frantic efforts to help the man’s des-ti-tute family arrange for burial and press for in-ves-ti-gations on the where-abouts of his key or-gans. Elsewhere, the body of a middle-aged man has been found dumped in a thicket in Kariobangi area of Mjini sub-location,Machakos Town.

Area assistant chief Mr. Fidelis Muli Mutiso said that the man was be-lieved to have been killed else-where and his body dumped in a thicket.

He also said that the body had in-ju-ries on the left eye, at the back of his head and his left arm.

A Machakos businessman was also robbed by a group of gang-sters on his way home. Ngala Mavusyu ,32,said he had just closed his butchery in town at Mjini Swahili village at about 8pm, with residents still milling around the streets, when a group attacked him from be-hind leaving him with nothing. The gangsters managed made away with the days sales of sh6000 among other valu-ables. Police in Machakos are investigating an incident where an unconscious taxi driver was found dumped in a forest before he later died in hospital. Machakos deputy OCPD Mr John Tanei confirmed the in-ci-dent to our reporters but refused to give details saying the matter was under in-ves-ti-gation.

However, relatives said the taxi driver was found unconscious in the forest at Miti Muonza area while his car was found dumped about 4km away.

A brother of the deceased said the car had however been cannibalized with major parts among them the engine, battery, tyres among others missing. The taxi driver died at the Macha-kos district hospital after he sus-tained serious in-ju-ries on the neck and head that were sus-pected to have occurred after he was hit with blunt objects.

Taxi drivers said the man left their parking near T.Tot hotel with three clients who wanted to be taken to the Kusyomuomo area.

The taxi driver who hailed from Kitise in Makueni district never returned and was found half dead in the forest at Kusyomuomo area about 7km from Macha-kos town.

They said few of them dared venture into the area at night because it was infested with robbers and carjackers who roam the Kaviani-Lita area at night. Resi-dents are de-manding in-creased police patrols in these ar-eas and action to re-solve these village murders.

Lawyer Nyakeri faces justice

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INALLY, the long arm of the law has caught up with a Machakos lawyer accused of biting a woman’s thumb.

The lawyer, Duncan Mumbo Nyakeri was hauled into a Macha-kos court where he was charged with causing grievous harm after a bizarre incident when he allegedly bit a woman’s right thumb last year .

Nyakeri was charged before Macha-kos Chief Magistrate F.N. Muchemi that on October 24, 2008 at Miwani estate he caused grievous bodily harm to Ms Teresia Wawira after he bit her thumb.

His lawyers Mr. Ngolya assisted by Mr Musila prayed the court to give the accused a personal bond because he was an officer of the court but the Chief Magistrate would not entertain that line of thought.

Instead, Ms Muchemi said a per-sonal bond was not suitable because the offence he was accused of was of a grave nature and released him on a sh200,000 bond with a surety or a cash bail of sh100,000.

Ngolya and his colleague may have been anticipating trouble as Nyakeri could neither meet the bond terms nor raise the cash bail. Not even one of the scores of his learned friends could stand up and be counted for him as surety, an indication of the suspect’s relationship with the legal fraternity.

By the time we went to press, a good two weeks after he was charged, Nyakeri was being held at the Machakos Police Station in circumstances not quite clear- instead of being at the Macha-kos GK Prison where other suspects unable to meet terms of bond languish awaiting trial.

The woman’s thumb was later amputated at the Machakos Gen-eral hospital after it started decaying following a severe in-fection.

His arraignment comes weeks after playing hide and seek with the police, sparking a long pro-test by Wawira that local po-lice had been compromised to thwart her efforts to have the law-yer face justice.

Another death as Yatta DC warns on sand menace

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sand harvester died while an-other was seriously injured as two others escaped death narrowly in Katangi Division after a sand mine collapsed as they excavated sand.

Yatta DC Mr Joseph Kinjo said the men were excavating sand at Kyasioni in Ikombe location Katangi di-vision when the acci-dent occurred.

He said villagers helped to res-cue the injured man who was taken to Matuu District Hospital. The DC banned sand har-vesting in the area to avert further deaths.

Frequent deaths in sand mines in Macha-kos, Mwala and Yatta districts have not deterred sand har-vesters from the activity that rakes millions of shillings in rev-enue to local au-thorities and sand traders in major towns like Nairobi, Thika, Athi River among others.

However, thousands of sand har-vesters in the villages remain im-pov-er-ished by the trade as they are only paid for their labour while loading lorries.

Last year, Mr Kinjo deplored the exploitation of the local commu-nity by unscrupulous busi-nessmen who buy two ma-jor commodities from the area at throw away prices. Mr Kinjo said although the dis-trict had abundant deposits of building stones and sand, locals do not benefit ad-equately from the re-sources.

He said if the prices were regu-lated by the local people, the run away poverty in the district would be alleviated and thou-sands of jobs created.

Mbooni DC gears up for fight with local civic leaders

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BOONI East District Commissioner is digging in for a fight with civic leaders over their alleged exclusion from the man-agement of famine relief dis-tri-bution.

The DC, Mr Frederick Shisia is on the spot for failure to invite civic leaders to the District Steering Group(DSG) where issues of fam-ine relief are discussed.

The issue was first raised by Nomi-nated Councillor Peter Mwanthi who also doubles up as Chairman of Mbooni CDF Committee and Personal Assis-tant of Cabinet Minister and local MP Mr Mutula Kilonzo, in a letter to the DC dated January 5 2009.

On January 6 2009, Mwanthi, in his capacity as Chairman of Coun-cillors Welfare Committee shot another letter to the Makueni County Coun-cil Chairman Mr Ber-nard Musau, urging him to ensure that coun-cillors are represented in DSGs in all districts the Makueni County covers- Mbooni East, Mbooni West, Nzaui, Kibwezi and Makueni itself.

He cited ‘ blatant stealing of fam-ine relief in our districts by the pro-vin-cial administrators’ as rea-son to demand rep-re-sen-tation. Mwanthi had demanded to know from the DC the amount of fam-ine relief that was coming to the dis-trict and how it was dis-trib-uted. His de-mand came as widespread re-ports filled the dis-trict that fam-ine relief food was being sold by ad-min-is-trators in both Mbooni East and Mbooni West. The DC never re-sponded to the letter but Mwanthi es-tab-lished that the DC had ex-pressed disgust over the letter and had gone a step further to solicit that Mr Mwanthi be re-moved at Mr Kilonzo’s PA.

He had copied the letter to his boss. Mutula responded to Mr Mwanthi in writing on January 26,2009, seemingly affirming Mr Mwanthi’s position as stated to the DC and added ‘ It is the re-spon-si-bility of councillors to in-sist on attending District Steering Committees whether in-vited or not. Only if they are rejected can one complain’.

Implicitly, Mutula’s letter was telling Mr Mwanthi to attend the DSG meetings whether invited or not and then raise hell if he is ejected from the meetings.

The minister them went on to re-quire Mr Mwanthi to furnish weekly reports on food dis-tri-bution to enable him (Mutula) make spot visits. He then availed to his PA a letter from the DC to the minister and a copy of another letter from the ministry of special programmes, detailing the amount of food al-ready send to Mbooni East and West.

Even if Mr Kilonzo did not come out to support his PA openly, the letter from the PS, Special Programmes Mr Ibrahim Maalim copied to Mr Shisia expressly re-quires the DC to work closely with local leaders in dis-trib-uting the food. The January 14 letter released 2,000 90 kg bags of maize, 125 25kg bag of Unimix and 100 6x3ltr cartons of vegetable oil to each of the Mbooni districts.

As we went to press, Mr Shisia had summoned councillors to a meeting in his office and Mr Mwanthi in-di-cated that he had not been in-vited. It is un-der-stood that Mr Shisia was working with some coun-cillors who do not see eye to eye with Mr Mwanthi and the situation is indicative that the DC and Mwanthi are gearing up to roll up their sleeves for an all out battle. The Anchor is watching.

Mavoko Town Clerk halts

approvals of building plans

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State of panic is sweeping all-over Athi River Town after the Muncipal Council of Mavoko Town Clerk Mr Wisdom Mwamburi put on hold approval of Building Plans.

This follows a discovery that thou-sands of those seeking to construct houses are not the le-giti-mate owners of the land they seek to develop.

Consequently, theTown Clerk has decreed that only appli-cants with proof of own-ership of the land they seek to develop with get the requisite approvals. “ Short of that, anyone erecting a struc-ture without the approval from the council will be doing so at his own peril”, said Municipal Planner Mr Francis Ndereba.

The situation is so fluid that those who hold letters of allotment of plots by the council are now dis-cov-ering that they hold du-bious documents as the mu-nici-pality has no authority to allocate land because it does not own any.

Besides, those the council issued with Temporary Occu-pation Licenses(TOLs), have pro-ceeded to erect permanent building on land they only have temporary license to occupy from the coun-cil.

One case in point is the 50 acre land belonging to the Kenya Meat Commission where past Town Clerks issued un sus-pecting resi-dents with TOLs and sub-se-quently approved building plans for permanent houses.

A tribunal has been holding a hearing over the dispute and sources say panic has gripped the municipal officials because all factors show that the allocation of TOLs and approval of de-vel-opment plans were done un-procedurally , if not illegally.

Some developers have erected structure worth millions of shillings in land they do not own and another has erected a building on a whole lane and it has to come down, a de-vel-opment that will have far reaching ramifications to the coun-cil and some past Town Clerks, some of whom have con-structed houses on land they do not legally own.

Unsuspecting residents are being lured into purchase of land by a group calling itself Municipal Coun-cil of Mavoko Self Help Group, where a former Town Clerk calls the shorts and pre-sided over the sale of land where Mlolongo currently stands.

Mr Mwamburi has send a tough warning to developers and in-vestors who were putting up building structures without seeking approval from the coun-cil of dire consequences.

Mr Mwamburi said he would en-sure laws on land and building plans are followed to the letter to ensure building standards were not com-pro-mised adding that those who defy the law would be arrested and charged in court.

The Town Clerk termed as ma-licious and propaganda alle-gations that he had refused to issue approvals, saying the council has issued 300 approvals to those who have met all the conditions.

Leaders of the land swindle had organised a protest against the council in a bid to exert pressure to have approvals made on the controversial plots.

The demonstrators who dis-persed before they could march to the council offices af-ter holding brief discussions were mainly construction workers coun-cil protesting against regu-lar arrests and harassment by coun-cil askaris besides heavy fines imposed by the council whenever they were found con-structing buildings whose owners have not sought consent from the civic authority. The owners of the plots have opted to fight from behind the scenes.

Mr Mwamburi said there were al-ready several cases in court including one being handled by the Kenya anti corruption commission where the council has been accused of issuing allotment letters on land be-longing to other people who bear the title deeds.

He said he would not issue allotment letters as the council had no land and neither would he sign letters of transfer of land as that responsibility rests with the Commissioner of Lands. “Those with fake letters and Titles must come alive to this reality and seek justice in the right way as protests will not frighten us into illegal action”, he said.

He cited the Kwa Mbemba Settlement land scheme in Mlolongo market where the coun-cil allegedly issued 1700 allotment letters yet the land has a title belonging to a public in-sti-tution which lays claim to the said land.The Clerk asked the public to be watchful of a group of conmen who were issuing un-sus-pecting developers with fake approvals for their plans using fake stamps and forged sig-na-tures.

He said they had al-ready arrested and arraigned in court a conman with fake stamps be-longing to the dis-trict public health officer, dis-trict physical planning officer, the district lands officer and their physical planner which he was using to approve building plans to unsuspecting developers.

Red Cross ups Road Safety Campaign

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he RED Cross Disaster Re-duction IInitiative in-ten-sified along Mombasa- Nairobi Highway as cam-paigners and officials con-ducted a Road safety cam-paign in Makindu.

The campaign was organised by the Makindu based High-way traffic base command on January 20 2009 con-junction with Kenya Red Cross.

The campaign comes in the wake of increased number of acci-dents in Makindu area es-pe-cially along the Makueni-Makindu road Junction with Nairobi-Mombasa Highway in-volving motorbikes and matatus.

In January alone, 29 lives were lost on the scene. Cru-cial causes of accidents in the area include over-loading passen-gers on mo-tor-bikes- which is common in Makindu.

Participants included the Makindu District Officer, In-surance com-pa-nies’ staff, Boda-boda and motorbike asso-ciation officials.

Boda-Boda and motorcycles are emerging as crucial means of trans-port in the area and key contributors to accidents.

The campaigners have accom-pa-nied Traffic police officers to educate the commu-nity on Road safety and traffic rules.

During the sessions, police dem-on-strate motorbike safety and a full cyclist kit which in-cludes : Helmet, gloves, re-flective jack-ets and shoes that the law requires op-erators to use before engaging on a ride.

Insurance cover for the motor bikes and driving licence for the riders, the campaigners say is a must before engaging in the business. These factors sounded like news to the op-erators.

The training also includes a road safety skit by Red Cross vol-un-teers in Makindu.

Participants, who also in-cluded ordinary villagers, seemed to en-joy the Question and an-swer session where the traffic officers responded to questions freely in an ex-tremely in-ter-active session. The public seemed eager to know basic road safety rules and traffic law that guides police in their daily assignments.

Elsewhere, a traffic police officer has blamed tempering with motor vehicle speed gov-er-nors for the increasing roads accidents.

Mrs. Elena Wairimu who was speaking during a road safety clinic at the Machakos bus park said some drivers have tended to unwire the speed gov-er-nors.

The clinic targeted drivers plying roads to and from Macha-kos, in-cluding Kitui, Kangundo, Makueni and Kibwezi routes.

It comes at a time when the Macha-kos- Wote Road is gaining notoriety as a killer road after accidents claimed lives in the last few months.

Other deadly scenes have re-cently been witnessed on Kitui Road, Machakos-Nairobi and Nairobi-Mombasa roads.

She said other had mod-ernized the speed gov-er-nor controls by in-tro-ducing the use of control buttons which they switch on and off.

She said when they come near the police check points, they switch on the speed gov-er-nors and switch off later.

She said drivers were careless on accident black spots es-pe-cially on rivers without bridge protections, sharp bends and roads under con-struction.

She said that the traffic de-partment would talk to the ministry of roads to ensure speed controls on the roads.

The police officer avoided to talk on corruption on the roads as another major source of acci-dents.

Police officers, vehicle owners and their drivers engage in corrupt liaisons that lead to the use of un-roadworthy vehicles on the roads, increasing chances of accidents.

Police accept bribes to allow some selected vehicles to use unaothorised use on a service called Mlengo, designed to reap in routes where they un-der-cut au-tho-rized route operators.

Catholics undergo local pilgrimage ritual on Koma Rock

FIFTY-seven parishes of the Catho-lic Diocese of Macha-kos carried out an annual Diocesan prayer day at Koma Rock Shrine on February 7, 2009.

Over 10,000 Christians from 9 districts, a group of Christians from Malindi and several groups from Nairobi and his environs turned up in what is taking the shape of a pil-grimage to the Shrine.

This is one of the yearly Di-oc-esan functions which all the priests, church leaders and the faithful participate.

The function was presided over by the Bishop of Machakos Dio-cese Rt Rev. Martin Kivuva Musonde,assisted by the Bishop of Kitui Rt. Rev. Antony Muheria.

The priests arrived on time to assist the Christians with the sac-raments of reconciliation.

Shortly after,the bishops and the priests led the faithful in following the way of cross from the foot of the Komarock hill. It was followed by the cel-ebration of the Eu-cha-rist at the Shrine of Our lady.

This annual prayer day brings the Diocese together to raise their voice in Unison. Several in-tentions were offered in prayer, which include Prayers of Thanks-giving foe His blessings to the Our Diocese, Prayer for the religious and po-litical leaders in Kenya-es-pe-cially for love and unity, prayer for the rain and that people may be more generous to one another during this time of starvation in Ukambani and the whole country, prayer for the souls of those who died pre-ma-turely during the current Nakumat and Molo fire in-ci-dents, prayer for asking God for the for-giveness of the sins of the whole Diocese and of our coun-try of Kenya at large, Prayer of Ado-ration to God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit united with Mary the Mother of Our Sav-iour Jesus Christ and Our Mother who is revered in a spe-cial way on this Komarock Hill.

Each year the Diocese has a theme which guides all pastoral initiatives, wich is launched during the annual prayer day. This, the theme is: “Young People, Christ is Our Ray of Hope”.

The Diocese has turned her attention this year to the wel-fare of the young people (spiri-tual and material), the youth occupies more than 60 percent of the whole population of the Church and this year after this launching the pastors of souls and others involved with the wel-fare of our young people are to find ways and means to pre-pare the young people to face the challenge which are facing them now and those which await them in the future.