The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) on Monday, February 13, dragged the National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK) to court over a Ksh50 million parcel of land.
Appearing before the Environment and Lands Court in Nyeri, EACC lawyers told the court that NCCK illegally acquired the land which was owned by the Commission.
The lawyers demanded the court order the council to relinquish ownership of the land, which was sold to it in 1996.
"The land belongs to the commission, a public entity, and could not change hands to an individual," Justice James Olola heard.
Meanwhile, the defendant argued that they were victims of a sour deal, as they had not been aware that the land sold to them had been grabbed.
According to court documents, former National Lands Commissioner Wilson Gachanja allegedly sold the parcel of land to the council.
Initially, EACC and NCCK had been directed to settle the matter out of court but failed to reach an agreement on the matter.
The anti-graft body noted that several parcels of land in the area worth Ksh1 billion had been illegally transferred to private owners during that period.
Gachanja was sent to early retirement in 1993 after the then government launched an inquiry into the illegal and irregular allocation of land under his watch.
EACC has been on a mission to retrieve land and property stolen from the commission and other government state agencies dating back to the late 1990s.
On January 3, it successfully recovered land valued at Ksh100 million which had been grabbed in Nyahururu. The land which was designated for the construction of a bus stop was sold to private developers.
The developers admitted the fault and voluntarily agreed to surrender the title deed of the land.
