Over 300 Ogiek families in Samburet forest demand for justice for forceful eviction from their land

Added: 2026-05-26

[00:00:00]More than 300 families from the Ugeka community living in Samburet forest in the Kibulgay area of ​​Kipkalion Kericho County are demanding justice following what they describe as a forceful eviction from the ancestral land by individuals. They allege influential politicians from Kericho and Bomet counties. Speaking to the press on Friday, the affected residents said the eviction operation left hundreds of families homeless and exposed that to harsh conditions with many allegedly losing houses, livestock and other personal belongings. Now the residents father claim that despite writing to the ethics and anticorruption commission ECC, the office of the president and the ministry of interior seeking intervention, little action has been taken to address their grievances or facilitate their return to the disputed land. The families are now appealing to the government to urgently step in and help them reclaim what they describe as the ancestral home saying they have nowhere else to settle.

[00:01:06]These people you see here in front of you are the children of the Burgh clan [sighs] there is no chance of finding others, these are the owners of the land.

[00:01:21]I was born here in 1950 and stayed here until I went to Chandoni. I left Shandon and wrote a job here in the forest until I feel that even our children don't study, we don't even have leaders for our children, if that day we would have been given a place to live, we would have found a leader for our children, we have suffered a lot, the president, help the senate, help us, don't leave us, help us, the people of Kiv, but you know that if you don't have a farm, you don't get anything, you ask for farming, you ask for living, you ask for hearing about a child, if he dies, we don't have anything, we don't have a farm to bury him, sometimes you are told to carry the child, but you know that he has died, even if it sees us, all these trees, our ancestors used to plant, we planted them and they were buried here, they just put their graves here and you are still being persecuted, you are still being expelled. Oh