NAKURU, KENYA: Members of a land buying company in Nakuru are beginning to despair over the process of reclaiming a 561-acre parcel they ‘lost’ in court 13 years ago. 0 inShare The parcel, situated in Nakuru North District, has been at the centre of a row between Endao Ltd, which has more than 700 members, and the estate of Njuguna Mwaura Mbogo. Endao lost the land to Mbogo in 2003 when the High Court in Nairobi accepted his claim of adverse possession. This is a method of gaining legal title to real property by the “actual, open, hostile and continuous possession of it to the exclusion of its true owner for a given period”. Mwaura moved to court in 2001 seeking to be declared a registered owner of LR 10581/ Nakuru through a transfer from E K Banks Limited. He succeeded in convincing the court that he had lived on the land unchallenged for more than four decades and was, therefore, its rightful owner. Wthout interruption “The plaintiff lived on the property without interruption since 1959,” the judge noted in his ruling, adding “He, therefore, acquired prescriptive rights over it.” Endao Company Ltd challenged the court order, saying another case concerning the ownership of the same piece of land was continuing at the Nakuru High Court when Mwaura obtained the orders. Then High Court Judge Philip Ransley allowed their application on October 6, 2004 and restrained Mwaura from alienating, transferring or selling the land until hearing of the application. However, Mwaura died on April 29, 2006, before the case could be heard. The case stopped a year later when he was not substituted in Endao Ltd’s application as required by law. Five years later, Endao Ltd moved to revive the case by substituting Mwaura with the administrators of his estate, Elizabeth Nyambura Njuguna and Francis Kamau Njuguna. In a ruling delivered in March last year, Justice Rose Ougo dismissed their application to substitute the plaintiff as premature and incompetent since the case had not been revived on the first instance. Another ruling delivered on April 29 this year dismissed attempts by Endao Ltd’s directors to revive the case. Justice John Mutungi noted that substitution of the plaintiff would revive the suit, but the applicants had failed to make an application for the court to give appropriate direction.
Posted on: Sat, 08 Jun 2013 16:56:21 +0000
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