Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) leaders from 16 counties have asked President William Ruto to finalise their resettlement.
IDPs’ chairman, Patrick Githinji said only a small section of families out of the 580,000 families displaced during the 2007/2008 Post Election Violence (PEV) had been settled.
He said it was unfortunate that politicians, especially those trivialising PEV and using it as a threat without caring about the affected people.
Githinji was particular with threats and statements juxtaposing the violence that left more than 1000 people dead, thousands displaced and property worth millions of shillings destroyed.
Speaking at former Bahati MP, Kimani Ngunjiri’s home, he asked President Ruto to quickly implement the IDP act to finally settle their suffering after being homeless for 18 years.
“The IDP Act is not for the 2007/2007 IDPs only, it will serve so many other people and parliamentarians trying to tamper with it should be warned because displacements do not stop and they are from various occurrences ranging from conflicts, natural calamities like floods and landslides among others,” he said.
Githinji said thousands of IDPs were still suffering rented homes across the country yet the government under former Presidents Mwai Kibaki bought close to 200 vast pieces of land to resettle them.
He added that the displaced families did not access their monies after accounts holding more than Ksh 2 billion were frozen by the former regime.
The IDP leaders asked Kimani Ngunjiri to intervene in their issue and talk to the President on their behalf.
“Ngunjiri has the interest of IDPs at heart and he has journeyed with them over the years and that is why we feel that he is the best person to talk about this issue with the President,” said Githinji.
