Resource information
The violence which followed the contested December 2007 Kenyan election was, arguably, an opportunity for historical grievances to be settled. This paper focuses on the land issue in regards to Kenya, asserting that land is a primary cause of conflcit in the country as it has been the crux of economic, cultural and socio-economic change. In fact as the author highlights, the land issue is not confined to Kenya but due to the importance of land for livelihoods and identity in Africa – with its multiple emotional, spiritual and ethnic dimensions – governance of land is at the heart of the state-society relationship in the continent. Principally regarding the Kenyan context - and in lieu of the government’s new draft land policy - the authors highlight key factors driving land dispute:
many post-colonial agrarian countries inherited extremely skewed patterns of land distribution. Few agrarian states have been able to successfully alter these patterns of land accumulation by an elite, and scarcity amongst the poor
the difficult nature of the interaction between customary and state-run systems, which gives rise to the question ‘who owns the land’. This is of massive political importance – 75% of conflicts over the past 25 years have taken place in agrarian states
fundamental structural factors include “rapid population growth, environmental degradation, and slow rates of economic development”, all of which put more pressure on rural and periurban farmers and livestock-keepers to produce more food on a declining resource-base
The paper offers a number of findings/recommendations, including -
‘immigrant’ communities’ feel a lack of secure tenure, and are then discouraged investing in environmentally sustainable practices. This feeds into stereotypes that they are merely ‘milking the land’. Expectation of attack and displacement may also prevent ‘immigrant’ communities from strengthening relationships with neighbouring ‘local’ communities. These weak intercommunal relationships contribute to tensions and more violence is therefore likely
tenure security (under both customary and statutory systems) has been greatly undermined, through arbitrary decision-making, corruption, backtracking on the part of government, and lack of redress for those who have lost land through violence. More appropriate law is needed – lawmakers must pay attention to perceptions at the local level and study obstacles to implementation of policies and laws
profound changes are required in the relationships between the state and local communities, as well as between different communities, as regards land governance. The governance of land must be institutionalized and rooted at the local level through innovative structures of community participation.
