MAU NAROK, KENYA – As slain land rights activist Moses Mpoe was laid to rest on Dec. 11, thousands of community members gathered to mourn and remember him.
During the funeral, murmurs circulated suggesting that senior government officials and their families were responsible for Mpoe’s assassination, as Mpoe played a major role in a court case that aimed to return more than 30,000 acres of land in the area known as Mau Narok to the Maasai community, a semi-nomadic people indigenous to East Africa who are known for their distinctive dress and customs. The land, originally taken from the Maasai people by British colonial authorities in the early 20th century, was later given to high-ranking politicians during the independence proceedings of the 1960s. In the midst of a pending court case and a government announcement that it would begin resettling internally displaced people, IDPs, in the disputed acres of Mau Narok, tensions escalated in the last months of 2010.
Mpoe, the most visible and vocal spokesman for Maasai land rights in Mau Narok, began leading a series of non-violent protests after the government began forcibly removing the Maasai people from Mau Narok in order to make room for IDPs on Nov. 1.
After a month of escalated tensions, a gunman on a motorcycle shot Mpoe at point-blank range as he sat in a traffic jam just a few miles from his home on Dec. 3. Mpoe died at the scene, leaving behind two widows and 18 children, 11 of whom are under 12. Six of his children are in secondary school, and the eldest attends Egerton University. Mpoe also left behind a legacy of land rights protests and an escalating campaign to fight for the rights of the Maasai people in Kenya’s Rift Valley.
Only a week after his funeral, the rumors proved to be true. David Njuno Mbiyu , the son of late Cabinet Minister Mbiyu Koinange, was arrested for the murders of Mpoe and Parsaaiyia Ole Kitu, known as Punyua, who was travelling with Mpoe at the time of the shooting. Mbiyu has been charged with two counts of murder, but has so far denied his role in the killings.
The link between Mbiyu and Mpoe is both direct and complex. The late Mpoe was the farm manager of the 4,900-acre Muthera Farm, owned by Mbiyu’s family and located in the disputed area of Mau Narok. Mpoe has openly challenged the legitimacy of Mbiyu’s family’s ownership of the Koinange estate and went so far as to name them in a court case pending in Kenya’s Superior court. The history of the disputed land, including the Muthera Farm, dates back more than a century. And Mpoe was at the forefront of the fight to give the land back to the Maasai people.
To date, Mbiyu and three associates have been arrested in connection with Mpoe’s murder. Last week, Nakuru District High Court Judge William Ouko denied a request by the widow of the late cabinet minister to bar police from arresting her in conjunction with the murder. Ouko rejected her unusual request and told police that if there is evidence linking her to the murder, they are free to arrest her.
When The Press Institute visited Mau Narok just two weeks after the murders, interviews with Mpoe’s friends and family revealed the intense hostilities he faced in his efforts to have land returned to the Maasai people. Mpoe’s brothers say he was the subject of frequent death threats and intimidation from local authorities and politically connected families.
Josephat Mpoe, the youngest brother of the deceased, says Mpoe received multiple death threats in connection with his land activism just days before his murder. He says the family filed complaints with local police, but no action was taken despite the increasingly visible role Mpoe played as the face of land rights in Mau Narok.
“The afternoon of Dec. 3, 2010, was sunny and beautiful,” Mpoe says of the last time he saw his brother alive. “I was with my two brothers in Mau Narok [until] about 5:30 in the evening. We said our goodbyes and Moses and Punyua got into the Ford Ranger, headed for Nakuru.”
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