Friday November 8 2019
Samburu pastoralists graze their livestock at Loisaba Conservancy in Laikipia on January 24, 2017. The railway network component of Lapsset is set to utilise chunks of community grazing lands in Isiolo, Garissa, Samburu and Turkana counties. PHOTO | TONY KARUMBA | AFP
n Summary
- Adjudication and registration is yet to be concluded and, as such, communities continue to lose their grazing land, thanks to demands from a speculative land acquisition frenzy.
- Left unresolved, the weak land governance and the overlap in territorial claims will compound the situation.
By MUMINA BONAYA
The Lamu Port-South Sudan-Ethiopia Transport (Lapsset) corridor project involves a railway, highway, crude oil pipeline and a fibre-optic cable connecting Kenya to Ethiopia, South Sudan and Africa’s Great Lakes region.
Started six years ago, it is Kenya’s transformational and integrated infrastructure corridor that is also aimed at opening up the North.
It is firmly on course: one of its main components, Isiolo International Airport, is complete; the railway network that is to run from Lamu to Isiolo has begun, and the third of 32 berths at Lamu Port is slated for completion by mid 2022.
The railway network component of Lapsset is set to utilise chunks of community grazing lands in the counties of Isiolo, Garissa, Samburu and Turkana.
Despite its good intentions, Lapsset’s inception in the northern counties continues to fuel the drive for land acquisition, marked by a land-buying frenzy since 2012.