Where do Mau evictees go from here?

The decision taken by hundreds of settlers to voluntarily leave the Mau Forest Complex is proof enough that poor settlers are more honest and law-abiding than the high and mighty.

The rich untouchables who own factories and palatial homes deep in the water tower are likely to remain put despite calls for everyone to leave the forest.

It is appalling that security agencies always target the powerless first even when they are not the only ones on the wrong.

But instead of thanking these settlers who have given up their homes for life by the roadside, Forestry Minister Noah Wekesa appears least concerned about their fate.

He has gone on record saying the evictees came from ‘somewhere’ and that is where they should return.

A statement signed by Mr Hassan Noor Hassan, the chairman of the interim co-ordination secretariat on the Mau Forest evictions, also said the evictees should return to their ‘original’ homes.

In the Rift Valley, a political hot-bed of tribal clashes, calls for people to go back to their original homes are known to have serious ramifications

What does Wekesa think would happen if the evictees returned to their ancestral homes to lands they had sold to others?

Has the Government considered that those without land could soon turn into security risks? Because desperate wananchi have nothing to lose apart from poverty and suffering, they could easily resort to robbery, banditry and cattle rustling.

A Kenyan is a Kenyan, whether he be a Mau Forest evictee, or of Somali, Asian, European or Arabic extraction.

All should be treated equally with the dignity they deserve even if they are guilty of breaking the law.

{S R Athembo Onyuro, Kisumu}

Cabinet Minister Noah Wekesa was recently quoted saying that evictees should return from whence they came. That was a reckless statement that could ignite ethnic passions.

Now that the Government has kicked out settlers from the Mau, it should look for alternative land to resettle them.

Why should we have squatters when foreigners wallow in opulence and wealth?

There are 13 rich individuals who own more than one million acres of land in Laikipia. This is enough land to resettle about 200,000 displaced families.

{Weldon Kirui, via e-mail}