“We might be forced out of here”: Long stateless, Kenya’s Pemba people now fight for their ancestral land
- After a long struggle for recognition, Kenya’s Pemba people were granted citizenship in 2023, but the battle continues as they seek to claim their ancestral land, where they’ve been forced to live as squatters for generations.
Image Description: This artwork features three figures before a large gate with a lush landscape beyond. The central figure, shirtless and in light pants, gazes through the gate, flanked by two figures in half-colored coats bearing Kenya’s national colors. Faded text in the background reads “Title Deed,” evoking themes of land ownership and access barriers.
Nairobi, Kenya (Minority Africa) — In 2017, Mwanahamisi Makame’s son was admitted to study medicine at the University of Nairobi, 280 kilometres from their home on an acre of land in Kwale County. Makame, a woman leader in Kichaka Mkwaju village was excited, but she needed to raise USD 2000 to facilitate the admission of her son.
“I went to the bank and applied for a loan. They asked for collateral and when I offered my land they requested for a title deed which was missing.”
Despite the land being ancestral land belonging to Makame, she could not provide the title deed, as until July 2023, the Pemba people of which Makame is part, were not recognised as Kenyans.
“My son missed college and [the] frustration led him into drug use’’ she says.
Domiciled in Kwale and Kilifi counties along the Kenyan Coast, the around 7,000 Pemba community, who are mostly fishers and farmers, is believed to have migrated to Kenya from the Zanzibar archipelago during the pre-colonial era.
“Our forefathers lived on this land, our grandfathers lived here, our fathers lived here, and we have lived here together with our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, but we have never had legal ownership of the land,’’ Shaame Hamis Makame, chairperson of the Kenya Pemba community, tells Minority Africa.
Since independence, the community has been pushing successive Kenyan governments for recognition as citizens. In 2016, they marched to the State House, but their efforts were brushed aside.
Taking a different route, the community, through Kilifi North MP Owen Baya, filed a petition in parliament in 2020, seeking to compel the government to grant them citizenship. In 2021, the community’s journey to recognition started bearing fruit when Parliament ruled that Pembas were Kenyans and recommended they be granted citizenship rights.
But it wasn’t until December 2022 that the Kenyan government announced it would begin the process of recognising the Pembas as Kenyan citizens. On January 30, 2023, President William Ruto issued a Special Gazette Notice recognising the Pemba people as one of Kenya’s ethnic communities. This led to the issuance of national identification documents to the Pemba people in March 2023.
Gaining citizenship meant that the Pembas, like any other Kenyan, could get a national identification document, which acts as a gate pass to government services and allows them to buy and own property and invest.
“(Before this,)we did not have citizenship, and this meant that we could not fight for our rights to own property, including land, and this opened an avenue for rogue individuals, including politicians, to grab land which belonged to the Pemba people,’’ Hamis Makame says.
Fight for Elusive Land Rights
After winning the battle to gain citizenship, the Pemba people embarked on a new battle: securing their ancestral land on which they lived as squatters.
“Having a document that identifies the Pemba as Kenyans gives us the courage to fight for our land rights. For long, we have been considered as squatters on our very own ancestral land,’’ says Kombo Kopa, an elder in charge of land issues among the Pemba community.
Kopa observes that their land was grabbed and subdivided, with part of it sold to a cement production company, by what he describes as “corrupt political leaders and land officials who fraudulently obtained title deeds and became the legal owners of Pemba land.”
“We moved to court in 2017 after being threatened with evictions. Our going to court was simply to stop the evictions and not to lay claim on the land since we did not have valid documents,” says Kopa. “It was easy for them to grab and subdivide the land because, since the days of our forefathers, the land has been managed as communal land.’’
Makame, says that some of their land has been lying unused for years because the owners come from other far regions of the country.
“People came as far as the western part of the country and were fraudulently allocated part of our land. Their land has been lying idle for years, they only show up when they hear that we have started farming on the said lands.’’
Makame says it is disheartening because they have been denied the right to benefit from their ancestral inheritance.
“We have land, but we cannot use it as collateral to get credit from banks because we don’t have documents. Our children’s education has greatly been affected since we cannot farm on this land and sell produce to raise money for school fees. We cannot use this land as collateral to secure school loans from banks’’ she says.
Dismissed by Court
The Kichaka Mkwaju community is currently in a court battle with a section of land grabbers laying claim to the community’s land. The community wants the government to grant them land ownership documents to enable them to secure their ancestral inheritance.
Tima Kirua, a woman leader and mother of five, reveals Pemba families always live in fear of being evicted from their ancestral land at any time. “For the last 50 years, this has been my home. I know no other home, but sadly, anytime we might be forced out of here,’’ she says.
On March 26, 2024, the Environment and Lands court in Kwale County dismissed a case filed on behalf of the community by Kombo Kopa and Omari Bakari, seeking to reverse the land’s ownership from individual owners to the community.
While dismissing the case, the judge said the “resettlement of squatters is solely the responsibility of the National Government through the Ministry of Land and Physical Planning in consultation with the National Land Commission and the County Government of Kwale. Let the Plaintiffs (chart)their next cause of action.”
Section 134 of the Land Act 2012 mandates the government of Kenya to provide access to land for shelter and livelihood. The law requires the government to provide alternative land to squatters, persons displaced by natural causes, development projects, conservation, internal conflicts, or other such causes that may lead to persons being displaced or moved.
In view of the dismissal of Kopa and Bakari’s case, Sabina Saiti, a human rights defender, wants the government to purchase land owned by absentee landlords and resettle the community.
“It is okay if the court has said that the land does not belong to the community, then let the government buy this land from the unknown landlords and give it to the Pemba people by issuing them title deeds,’’ she says.
Sitati further warns that moving them away from their ancestral land would violate their fundamental rights, saying, “It is not just about land but their cultural practices and beliefs that are tied to this land. Moving them to a different place will amount to denying them the right to worship and practice their cultural beliefs.’’
The community has since filed an appeal against the ruling, seeking for the court to declare that they are not squatters and that their ancestral land belongs to them.
“It is our hope that justice will prevail in the end and our right to own our ancestral land will be preserved,’’ says Kopa.
Edited/Reviewed by Samuel Banjoko, PK Cross Adebola Makinde, Caleb Okereke, and Uzoma Ihejirika.
