ELDORET North MP William Ruto on Tuesday evening met CID Director Francis Muhoro to discuss ongoing investigations into a 100-acre farm in Rift Valley. Ruto has asked the police to investigate claims by Adrian Gilbert Muteshi that he grabbed the farm in Uasin Gishu district during the 2007/2008 post election violence.
Ruto says he bought the land in good faith from Dorothy Yator and he wants the CID to investigate those who defrauded him. Muteshi has filed a case in the High Court seeking to recover his farm. Ruto has offered to return it but balked at Muteshi's additional demand for compensation. The International Criminal Court, where Ruto is charged with crimes against humanity including forceful eviction, is closely following Muteshi's case.
Yesterday, Muhoro confirmed meeting Ruto in Mazingira House but said detectives from the CID Land Fraud Unit were yet to start their investigations. "Ruto came for a meeting with me. He is yet to record a statement on the claims," stated Muhoro. Yesterday, Ruto was unavailable for comment despite text notifications.
Two weeks ago at a press conference, Ruto described himself as an innocent buyer and called on the CID to investigate those responsible. Ruto said he bought 86 acres of land in September 2008 from Dorothy Jemutai Yator of ID No 12830496 in a transaction conducted by Elizabeth C. Rotich Advocates of Eldoret. “I did due diligence before the acquisition. All the records indicated that the land belonged to the person in question and I had no reason to doubt the documents because they were from the Ministry of Lands,” he said.
Ruto said he had decided to give up the farm after the Lands ministry disowned the title deed as fraudulent in March 2011. Ruto accused Muteshi of making up the 2008 date to tie him to the post election violence and challenged him to lodge a formal complaint to the authorities. "Those responsible for this eviction, including myself, should be prosecuted if found to have anything to do with it. Muteshi must be honest. Allegations that he was at the farm in 2008 is actually a fraud. I've been the area MP for 15 years and nobody lived on that farm. The last time somebody was seen on the farm was in 1992. Muteshi was not living in the farm in 2008,” he said.
High Court Judge Hannah Okwengu has directed that Muteshi's case be heard at the High Court on December 15 after Ruto’s lawyer sought more time to respond to the IDP’s claims. The court extended interim orders for preservation of the land pending the hearing. According to Muteshi, the land with a market value of Sh50 million was fraudulently transferred from his name to that of Dorothy Yator who then sold it to Ruto.
The whereabouts of Yator are unknown. According to the documents Ruto presented to the media, Dorothy acquired the land in 1980 but a transfer of land in the settlement scheme was only registered in her name on August 20, 2007. Ruto said he did not know where Dorothy Yator was now, and he could not explain to journalists why he bought the land just after the mass evictions in the Rift Valley.
He said that Yator's husband was an employee of the Lands ministry but he did not know where exactly he worked. Dorothy's ID number suggests that she acquired it in 1991 or 1992 when she reached 18 years of age. This would have made her seven years old in 1980 when she allegedly bought the land.
Muteshi claims he bought the land in 1989 but was forced to stop farming in January 2008 due to post-election violence. He claims his farm was forcefully taken over during the poll violence. He said that last May he learned that the people on his land were Ruto’s workers. He was further informed that Ruto had purchased the land from Yator who had subdivided it and registered it under nine titles.
He also confirmed the acquisition by Yator from the Eldoret Lands Office. Muteshi says he was unable to conduct an official search at the Uasin Gishu District Registry because the staff there were uncooperative. In March, he wrote to Commissioner of Lands seeking assistance who in turn sought an urgent response from the District Land Registrar at Uasin Gishu.
The district land office in Eldoret replied in June 8 saying the land had been registered in Yator’s name before it was transferred to Ruto. Muteshi wants the court to intervene arguing that he was a victim of fraud, manipulation of government processes, underhand dealings and unfair treatment by the state in the sense the Attorney General and the district security machinery had not acted to assist him reclaim his land. Muteshi has also named the AG, the Commissioner of Lands and a surveyor Patrick Opiyo, who surveyed and subdivided the land as parties in the suit.
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