Families living in colonial villages 60 years after independence

Mary Waheto a resident of Micha Colonial Village at Gatitu in Nyeri displays her allotment letter. [Kibata Kihu, Standard]

Wanjiru found herself and her son at the mercy of ruthless home guards alongside hundreds of women in her village.

"Now the women were left to fend for themselves as their husbands worked on farms owned by the wealthy. That is how we were left behind. We could not tell if our husbands would come back or not. And as a matter of fact, some men never returned," Wanjiru said.

She was one of the lucky few women whose husbands returned. But before they reunited, Wanjiru experienced unimaginable hardship in raising their son by herself.

Life became a struggle for Wanjiru and the other women as they were forced into hard labour for days with no pay and had little or no food to eat.

Six decades after independence, thousands of families are still living in dehumanising colonial villages. They have been demanding that the villages be surveyed so they can be issued with title deeds or be resettled in alternative land but their efforts have not been successful.

Those living in the villages have little to smile about as they do not own the small pieces of land they live in.

At Kirichu Colonial Village in Nyeri County, Muhia Githenji explained that he inherited his home from his parents, and they had lived all their lives in the small space as a family.

"The trouble with living in a colonial village is we cannot build a permanent house because we have no ownership documents."