It all began last week when the East African Portland Cement Company triumphed in a protracted legal struggle against the farmers' group Aimi Ma Lukenya over a parcel of land in Mavoko, Machakos County, that was up for grabs.
The Farmers' Association's lawsuit was dismissed last week by the Environment and Land Court because the defendants were not served with the updated pleadings.
The case has been pending at Machakos County's Environment and Land Court since 2014.
We received a paper on Sunday from Aimi Ma Lukenya through its representatives Julius Mutie Mutua, Alex Kyalo Mutemi, and Pascal Kiselin Basilio, claiming ownership of County Estate, where demolition work is ongoing.
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We discovered the document was fake after submitting it for verification to the Ministry of Lands.
Aimi Ma Lukenya allegedly submitted a false title deed with entry number 7, while records from the Ministry of Lands reveal that entry 6 is the final one.
A permanent injunction prohibiting the cement manufacturer from taking any further action on the parcel of land is what the farmers union sought in their lawsuit against East African Portland Cement.
East African Portland Cement was restricted by a court injunction obtained by Aimi Ma Lukenya in 2016.
"That a temporary injunction be and is hereby issued prohibiting the defendant or its agents from erecting, building, occupying or in any other form interfering with Land Reference Number 10424 until the hearing and determination of this suit," indicated the court document.
Justice Annet Nyukuri stated last week that the plaintiff, Aimi Ma Lukenya, had failed to serve the amended pleadings on the defendants within the three weeks as ordered by the court in May, nearly seven years after the order was issued. She further warned that the case would be dismissed if the plaintiffs did not comply.
The reason Aimi Ma Lukenya did not submit the pleadings by the deadline is still being determined.
Justice Nyukuri dismissed the action on October 9 due to the plaintiff's inability to serve its documents as required by the court in May.
For now, the countless families who suffered losses of millions of shillings and saw their homes reduced to rubble in recent days will continue to calculate their losses.
