City Hall rocked by Sh120million land compensation scandal
The Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) has been petitioned to launch a probe into the payment of Ksh120 million by the Nairobi City County Government to a landowner in Eastleigh, which a whistleblowers claims was overvalued.
In a letter written to DCI boss Mohamed Amin, Duncan Konyando says the actual value of the land stands at Ksh16 million.
According to the whistleblower, the overpricing of the land was allegedly meant to benefit a senior City Hall honcho and his henchmen.
The letter, which The Informer Media Group has seen, further shows that a payment of Ksh50 million has already been made to the owner of the piece of land, LR 209/13669, Paul Mabwa Asila through the law firm of S. Owino and Associate Advocates, despite the existence of a court order barring the same.
He says the illegal payment of Sh50million by the Nairobi City County government authorised on November 15, 2024, to the account of Stephen Owino of S.O. Owino and Associate Advocates against an existing court order by one Ndegwa.
Documents seen by The Informer Media Group indicate that the Ksh50 million was authorised on November 15 last year as initial payment after the Environment and Lands Court ordered in May 2023 that Paul Asila be compensated after the land was taken by the county.
Konyando, however, claims the lawyer refused to transfer it to Asila and instead shared it with a top official at City Hall and his associates, sparking a barrage of complaints from him that lifted the lid on the whose saga.
In 2023, the Environment and Lands Court had established that the quarter piece of land rightfully belonged to Asila and that county government was wrong to alienate it.
The court ordered the county to compensate the plaintiff an amount equivalent to the market value of that time plus the damages for depriving Asila of the use of the land.
“Nairobi City County to pay Sh120 million in full and final settlement as the land rightfully belongs to Asila,” the court ruled.
On February 27 last year, Justice Oscar Angote of the Environment and Land Court made similar orders triggering the latest turn of events.
Separately, the Director of Land Administration in the ministry of Lands Gordon O. Ochieng, in a response to an inquiry by the county secretary, also confirmed on January 25, 2022 that Asila’s title was auntenthic and was issued by the Lands office.
