How banditry drove Marakwet families into a death trap: Inside the mudslide tragedy

Locals who lived in the rolling fields of Kerio Valley were pushed by perennial cattle rustling raids to settle and farm on the Marakwet escarpments, causing mudslides that have so far claimed 36 lives, locals say.

According to residents, the death trap that is the hanging valley can only be good for its scenery, punctuated by imposing rocks and ideal, perhaps, for movie filming, but not for settlements.

Government authorities now declare that locals in landslide-prone areas will have to choose between relocating to the banditry-prone Kerio Valley and living precariously on the escarpments, with the hope that the last catastrophe will be the last.

Julius Komen, 70, pauses as he nostalgically recalls the days of his youth, when the expansive rugged escarpments, filled with dense foliage, and people lived along the fertile Kerio Valley.

Komen says people living in the areas currently affected by landslides coexisted peacefully with nature until the 1970s when populations settled on the escarpments after cattle rustlers intensified raids.

To him, it is not a shocker that farmlands in affected areas are now filled with huge boulders following the recent landslides and mudslides that have rocked the valley.

“Families were forced by frequent banditry attacks to move to the hanging valley. We would not have witnessed the recent mudslides and rockfalls if the Kerio Valley were peaceful,” says Mzee Komen.

Komen goes ahead to say: “Many locals grow mangoes in the valley but retreat to the escarpments where they live in the evenings. It is all because of insecurity.”

He recalls that there was a massive relocation of families to the escarpment in 1977 after cattle rustling attacks.

“They moved to the escarpments because the valley was no longer safe, especially for women and children. Locals also felt safer on the escarpments because they are located in a vantage position and they would see the attackers coming and would hide from them,” says Komen.

James Yego says the earth cracks along the escarpment were ignored by both government authorities and locals.

According to Yego, earth cracks were spotted in parts of Tirap and Kwenoi escarpments a week before the Murkutwa, Chesongoch, Kabetwa and Embobut disasters.

“Most people, especially those living along the escarpments, saw the earth cracks, but they underestimated the impact. No one could imagine that sections with cracks would break away and trigger mudslides in lower areas,” he says.

Calls for the resettlement of people living in the hanging valley have intensified, but locals feel that returning to the fertile lands of the Kerio Valley will expose them to banditry attacks.

Mzee Komen says populations had exited the Kerio Valley en masse following increasing cases of malaria.

“If locals are to return to the valley, which is flat and not prone to mudslides, then the government should upscale health facilities to deal with rampant cases of malaria,” he adds.

Red Cross North Rift manager Oscar Okumu says relocation of populations risking their lives by living in the escarpment is a permanent solution to perennial mudslides and landslides.

“We are in a response situation, but we want to look at long-term measures. We are going to engage communities further to ensure that they are moving to safer grounds and avoiding farming in landslide-prone areas,” says Okumu.

Former Marakwet East MP and Cabinet Minister in President Mwai Kibaki’s administration, Linah Kilimo, proposes the conversion of the hanging valley to forest and wildlife reserves and locals offered alternative land.

“Elgeyo Marakwet has large acreages of forest plantations which can be turned into settlement areas and the escarpment converted to a forest, wildlife conservancy and a tourist site,” she proposed.

Her sentiments were echoed by Paul Kibet, who asked the government to acquire the ancestral lands along the escarpment and turn it into an indigenous forest.

“Locals are willing to give up the landslide-prone escarpment. Locals can be resettled on commercial sections of gazetted forests,” said Kibet.

Interior Cabinet Secretary (CS) Kipchumba Murkomen, who also comes from Marakwet East, says the insecurity problem in Kerio Valley has been contained and that the valley is ready for settlement and investment.

The CS says locals were pushed to the landslide-prone area by insecurity in Kerio Valley.

Murkomen was a member of a taskforce which proposed the resettlement of nearly 3,000 forest dwellers in 2013.

However, a number of forest dwellers who were not compensated in 2013 were forced to live along the landslide-prone escarpments.

“Part of the reason why farming is happening along the escarpment is because people were running away from insecurity. Ordinarily, they would be living in the valley,” Murkomen says.

He continues: “The biggest problem with the deforestation in Elgeyo Marakwet is landlessness.

“In 2013, forest dwellers were moved to areas along the escarpments as a compromise solution as the government sought a permanent solution and settlement of the squatters. If you go further to the escarpments, a lot of the mudslides happened on the Embobut side. Poor farming practices along the escarpments, which is ancestral land, is precipitating the problem.”

According to Murkomen, the hanging valley can be turned into mango-growing areas instead of growing maize and millet.

“The best solution is to move locals from the escarpments to the Kerio Valley and convert the escarpments into fruit farming zones, and irrigation is done in the valley to produce other food crops,” he adds.

Environment CS Deborah Barasa says the Elgeyo Marakwet tragedy will inform a new policy direction on landslide-prone areas.

“We are going to review our policies as we search for a permanent solution to flooding and landslide challenges,” she said when she visited the affected areas on Tuesday.

Treasury Principal Secretary (PS) Chris Kiptoo says the ministry will support the Ministry of Environment to find a lasting solution to the perennial landslides and mudslides.

“The Ministry of Environment had come up with a master plan for the restoration of forests in the Cherangany water catchment area,” Dr Kiptoo said.

Even before the gigantic mud and rocks descended the landslide-prone hanging valleys of Elgeyo Marakwet and swept through overarching fields downstream, signs of a disaster were crystal clear.

Mudslides and landslides had loomed over the hanging valleys for decades.

Despite its precariousness, the hanging valley is an ancestral land to Elgeyo Marakwet communities, locals say.

For years, earth cracks have sent chills down the spines of locals whose lives have been hanging by a thread.

When the long rains kicked off late in March through April and May, earth cracks were widespread from Kocholwo in Keiyo South to Kibendo and Anin in Keiyo North and to the scene of the recent disaster in Murkutwa, Chesongoch, Kabetwa and Embobut in Marakwet East.

When the deadly deluge, which pounded for hours on Friday night, extending to Saturday morning, struck, locals in the affected areas were already living in fear.

They lived down at the base of the steep escarpments but, from a distance, watched helplessly as farming activities continued in areas that were already cracking, waiting to release massive soils and rocks down the slopes.