Shock and dismay has engulfed parents and the teaching fraternity at Technology primary school in Murang’a county after a resident hived off part of the school’s compound.
The resident armed with a court order Friday morning deployed workers to fence a portion of the school leaving pupils with minimal space for playing.
The parcel of land under contention was given to the institution in 1990 for expansion after intervention by the then Murang’a District Commissioner.
The acquired piece of land was to be compensated with an alternative land by the defunct Murang’a County Council.
The primary school was established in 1983 near Murang’a town on land belonging to then Murang’a College of Technology, which has currently been upgraded to the Murang’a University of Technology.
Afterwards due to increase in the school’ population, three plots neighbouring the institution were acquired to expand its compound.
Two of the plots belonged to Kenya Industrial Estate (KIE) and the other belonged to the resident, Julius Ngige Munjunga.
KIE and Munjunga were to be compensated with alternative land by the defunct Murang’a county council with the former now admitting to have gotten another land, but Munjunga claims not to have been compensated to date.
The school committee chairman Harrison Mwangi observes that the school has been battling with the claimant in court since 2013, but unfortunately the plaintiff won the case in 2017.
“Munjunga emerged in 2013 to claim compensation for the land he had given to the school, something which prompted a legal suit. He won the case and the school appealed against the ruling, but in 2019 the Lands and Environment court in Kirinyaga concluded the appeal suit in favour of Munjunga,” explained the chairman.
He observed that as the school’s management body, they approached the county government so as to provide an alternative land for the school, a matter which is yet to be concluded.
“When we approached the county governor Mwangi wa Iria he directed that the resident be compensated with an alternative land so as to save the school compound. We are still waiting for the assistance but today, Munjunga has fenced off the contested piece of land,” said the chairman.
Mwangi is now appealing for assistance saying the school needs more land for expansion of its infrastructure, even as its number of pupils continues to increase.
“We are appealing to the county government to intervene and help our institution not to lose an inch of its land,” stated Mwangi.
The primary school is further battling with the local university which now wants to fence off the school compound which happens to be in the latter’s domain.
However, the tussle with Murang’a university is still under scrutiny by the National Lands Commission (NLC) but currently the institution of higher learning is doing a perimeter wall around its land.
By Bernard Munyao
