MAJENGO’S LAND QUESTION: RESIDENTS SEEK ANSWERS AS DAGHY LISTENS TO TITLE-DEED AND OWNERSHIP CONCERNS

 CIVICLENS GAZETTE

Thursday, 13 August 2026

By CivicLens Gazette Investigative Desk

A long-running land question in the heart of Laikipia East

For generations, land has been more than an economic asset in Laikipia East. It has been a question of security, identity, family inheritance and the ability of ordinary residents to build a future without fear that their homes or investments could one day be challenged.

In Majengo, Nanyuki, that question remains particularly sensitive.

On Thursday, August 13, 2026, Douglas Mwangi, popularly known as Daghy, met residents and landowners in Majengo to listen to their concerns surrounding land disputes, ownership documentation and the long-standing challenge of obtaining title deeds.

The meeting comes against the backdrop of a land question that has occupied public institutions for years. Parliamentary records, county documents and court judgments show that concerns over land ownership documentation in Nanyuki are not a new political talking point. They have repeatedly reached Parliament, the courts, the county government and land administration authorities.

The Majengo conversation therefore sits within a much larger story: the struggle to transform occupation and informal claims into secure, legally recognised land ownership.

Parliament has already acknowledged the Majengo title-deed problem

The concerns raised by Majengo residents have a documented history.

On March 27, 2024, Senator John Kinyua sought a statement in the Senate on the processing of land ownership documents for residents of Majengo and Likii villages in Nanyuki Ward.

The Senator specifically asked the relevant Senate committee to establish the status of title-deed processing, identify challenges delaying the process and state when the State Department of Lands and the National Land Commission would issue affected residents with ownership documents.

The issue had been raised even earlier.

In 2019, Parliament recorded a question concerning the issuance of title deeds to residents of Thigithu Estate, Likii, Majengo and Solio villages, alongside other settlements in Laikipia.

And a parliamentary record from 2022 again referred to villages including Kabiru, Likii, Majengo and Manguo as areas where residents were living without title deeds.

The message from these records is difficult to ignore: Majengo's land question has outlived individual political administrations and electoral cycles.

The county has begun regularisation—but disputes remain a critical obstacle

There is also evidence of movement from the county government.

County land officials undertook a plot-to-plot beneficiary verification exercise in Majengo in December 2025. The information collected was to undergo further verification before being forwarded to the National Land Commission for processing of allotment letters and eventual titling.

The county described Majengo as one of the informal settlements undergoing land formalisation and ownership regularisation.

The process includes beneficiary verification, confirmation of parcel boundaries, surveying, preparation of verified lists and coordination between the county government and the National Land Commission.

But there is a crucial condition.

According to county information, regularisation and issuance of ownership documents cannot proceed until pending and unresolved disputes are conclusively addressed through legal channels or the designated dispute-resolution mechanism.

This point helps explain why the meeting between Daghy and Majengo residents matters.

The challenge is not simply printing title deeds.

It is first determining who is legally entitled to receive them.

When ownership records collide

Kenya's Environment and Land Court at Nanyuki has handled several disputes demonstrating how complicated land ownership can become when competing claims emerge.

In one case involving Nanyuki Municipality Block 8/905, the plaintiff claimed to have been registered as proprietor and held a certificate of lease. He later discovered that the ownership records had been changed and another title issued. The case involved the Land Registrar and competing claims over the property.

Another Nanyuki case involved an unsurveyed residential plot where one party claimed allocation dating back to the 1990s, while another party subsequently held documentation relating to the property. The Environment and Land Court eventually declared the parcel to belong to the plaintiff and ordered the defendant to vacate.

A separate case involving Nanyuki/Marura Block III/310 concerned competing ownership claims after registration was cancelled and another party was registered.

These cases do not establish that every disputed parcel in Majengo has been illegally acquired.

They establish something more fundamental:

Land documentation must be traced through the legal chain of allocation, survey, registration and transfer before ownership can safely be declared.

Why a title deed matters

For an ordinary family, a title deed is not simply a piece of paper.

Secure land tenure can determine whether a person can confidently invest in a permanent home, transfer property to children, sell legally, obtain financing where eligible, or defend ownership in court.

That is why the county's regularisation programme has described secure ownership documents as important to allowing residents to use their property as an economic asset.

The economic stakes are also increasing.

Nanyuki has experienced growing investor interest and rising land values. The Standard reported in October 2025 that land prices around Nanyuki had risen substantially amid increasing demand for property and investment.

As land becomes more valuable, unresolved ownership questions become potentially more consequential.

A resident without clear documentation may find themselves vulnerable to competing claims precisely when the economic value of the land is rising.

Majengo is part of a wider Laikipia story

The problem should not be viewed in isolation.

Across Laikipia, disputes have involved squatters, historical occupation, farmers, pastoralists, land-buying societies, family inheritance, public land and competing title claims.

Parliamentary records have previously called for acceleration of title issuance to bona fide owners and attention to land demarcation.

In 2024, the Senate also sought information on land ownership documents and green cards affecting residents in Nanyuki and parts of Laikipia.

The State Department for Lands lists Nanyuki as Laikipia's land registry, responsible for land registration, adjudication and settlement, administration, valuation and survey and mapping functions.

That makes the Nanyuki registry central to resolving the documentary questions surrounding disputed parcels.

What Daghy’s engagement means politically

Daghy's meeting with Majengo residents comes as he positions himself as an aspiring parliamentary representative for Laikipia East.

Listening to residents on a question as sensitive as land can therefore carry political significance.

But the value of the engagement should ultimately be measured not simply by the meeting itself, but by what happens after the listening session.

Residents need more than political sympathy.

They need a clear process.

They need to know which parcels have completed surveying, which beneficiaries have been verified, which cases remain disputed, what documentation is missing, which matters require the National Land Commission, and which disputes must be determined by the courts.

Most importantly, residents need assurances that any eventual titling process will protect legitimate owners while preventing disputed or fraudulent claims from being converted into official documents.

The politics of land requires caution

Land is one of the easiest subjects for political actors to turn into accusation.

But responsible leadership requires a higher standard.

A disputed title should not automatically be described as a "stolen title." A person occupying land should not automatically be described as a squatter. And an allegation circulating on social media should not automatically become a journalistic fact.

The court record itself demonstrates why caution matters.

Some disputes involve competing titles. Others involve alleged fraud. Others involve allocation letters, leases, family claims or questions over survey boundaries.

The legal answer depends on the evidence in each parcel.

For CivicLens Gazette, the central question should therefore remain who has the legally verifiable right to each parcel—not who can make the loudest political claim.

A problem that demands institutions, not just politics

The Majengo meeting has placed an old problem back into public conversation.

But solving the problem will require cooperation among the residents, county government, State Department for Lands, National Land Commission, surveyors, land registrars, courts and elected leaders.

The county's ongoing regularisation programme provides an existing institutional pathway. Parliamentary records demonstrate that the matter has already attracted national attention. The courts provide mechanisms for resolving competing claims.

What remains is to connect these pieces into a process that residents can understand and trust.

For Majengo families who have lived on their land for years, the ultimate objective is straightforward:

certainty.

Certainty about where their boundaries lie.

Certainty about who owns what.

Certainty that legitimate ownership will be protected.

And, where the law permits, certainty that the title deed promised for years will finally become a reality.

CIVICLENS VERDICT

The Majengo land question is not a new political invention.

It is a documented, longstanding land-administration challenge that has reached Parliament, county institutions and the courts.

Daghy's engagement with residents brings political attention to the issue at a crucial moment, particularly as the county continues with land regularisation efforts.

But the real test will come after the microphones are switched off.

Will disputed parcels be identified?

Will genuine beneficiaries be verified?

Will surveys and records be reconciled?

Will legitimate owners receive their documents?

And will residents finally have a transparent process through which land disputes can be resolved without fear, political intimidation or misinformation?

For Majengo, the title deed is ultimately about more than ownership.

It is about the security of home, family and future.

And after years of waiting, residents are asking for something that should never have been controversial in the first place:

to know, with legal certainty, what land is theirs.