Surveyor testifies in Ruto land case

By Isaiah Lucheli

 A land surveyor on Thursday testified in a land ownership tussle pitting Deputy President-elect William Ruto and an Internally Displaced Person (IDP) Adrian Muteshi at the High Court.

Patrick Opiyo of Opiyo and Associates, a surveyor based in Kisumu, told the court the husband of a woman alleged to have sold the land to Ruto ordered for the subdivision of the 100-acre land in Turbo, Uasin Gishu County.

Opiyo told High Court Judge Rose Ougo that Daudi Kiptugen, who is a Ministry of Lands official and the husband to Dorothy Yator currently working in Maralal, had sought his services to have the parcel of land divided into nine portions while he was working in Nandi Hills.

Fraud and machination

The surveyor explained that Kiptugen, who was working with the Lands office in Nandi Hills then, had informed him that the land belonged to his wife Yator and at no time was the land registered under Muteshi’s name.

Opiyo submitted that Kiptugen, who had introduced himself as a Ministry of Lands employee working in the physical planning department, told him to carry out the subdivision work on the parcel of land.

In her earlier submission, Yator who is a farmer in Eldoret had said she was a victim of fraud and machination, as she neither owned the land nor was involved in any land dealing with the former MP.

Yator had explained that the signatures on the documents were false and defended her husband from claims that he had been involved in the transaction that deprived Muteshi of his land.

Several anomalies were exposed in court, which included the postal address, the passport size picture, the signatures, among others.