Gov’t evicts Bungoma developer from Ksh.35M property recovered by EACC

The government has reclaimed a prime parcel of land worth more than Ksh.35 million that had been illegally acquired in Bungoma Town, following a successful court battle led by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC).

The contested property in Bungoma township sits next to the Bungoma State Lodge in the Milimani area and was unlawfully occupied by Judith Nekoye, a senior banking official, who has now been evicted pursuant to court orders.

In a judgment delivered on October 9, 2025, Justice Enock Cherono of the Environment and Land Court in Bungoma declared that all transactions leading to Nekoye’s acquisition of the property were “fraudulent, illegal, null and void ab initio.”

The court further directed the Bungoma Land Registrar to cancel all entries and registration documents related to the illegal lease and restore the land to the State Department for Housing and Urban Development.

“The registration of all the entries related to the issuance of the Certificate of Lease purported to have been issued on 24th October 2016 to the Plaintiff in respect of Bungoma Township/169 be hereby cancelled,” ruled Justice Cherono.

The judgment arose from a case between the accused and the EACC, where the commission successfully proved that the property—originally reserved by the government in 1961 for construction of civil servants’ quarters—had been irregularly transferred to private ownership.

Court documents seen by Citizen Digital showed EACC probe revealed that the land, which hosted House No. HG/15, was part of government housing and was never available for sale or reallocation. The court heard that Nekoye acquired it in 2016 through a chain of fraudulent transactions originating from a flawed allocation in favour of Charles Osioma Nyasani, a former civil servant.

Justice Cherono found that neither the required Part Development Plan (PDP) nor an approved Registry Index Map (RIM) existed for the parcel, rendering the lease procedurally defective.

“The allotment and subsequent lease were issued without lawful authority and are therefore null and void,” the judge stated.

Following the ruling, the court issued eviction orders directing Nekoye, her servants and agents to vacate the property and permanently restraining them from trespassing or dealing with it in any way, except by surrender to the government.

Bungoma County Commissioner Thomas Sankei on Thursday confirmed that security teams had moved to enforce the orders, noting that the property has now been repossessed by the State.

During proceedings, it emerged that Nekoye had demolished a government house on the plot and constructed a multimillion-shilling maisonette, which now faces demolition as part of the recovery process.

EACC Head of Corporate Affairs and Communication Stephen Karuga confirmed that the Commission has lodged the relevant documents with the Bungoma Land Registrar for cancellation of the previous registration and issuance of a new title in favour of the government, as ordered by the court.

Civil society representatives led by Emmanuel Were lauded the EACC for what they termed a landmark victory in safeguarding public assets from land grabbers.

“This ruling is a strong message to those who misuse their positions to take over public land. Milimani estate is government property and should be protected for public benefit,” said Were.

He urged the commission to intensify investigations into illegal allocations within Bungoma and neighbouring counties, saying land grabbing of public spaces had become rampant.

The recovered property has since been handed back to the State Department for Housing and Urban Development for public use.