The four farmers are waiting beneath a tree when we arrive. It is February, which means that it is almost time for the rainy season in Kenya and they have started the process of clearing the land for planting. It is uncomfortably humid in Lamu County where we are, but beneath the tree, one of the region’s majestic baobabs, a light breeze cools us.
The view of the ocean from the site of a proposed coal power plant facility in Lamu County_Claire Martens. Image supplied. The port’s controversial cousin is the Lamu Coal Power Plant facility. This aspect of the LAPSSET project has garnered a lot of. The farm we are currently sitting on has been cut through by a road to the site where the future coal plant will be developed. When we visit the site later that day, there is nothing to see and you can barely tell the site exists. It’s a disconcerting feeling. Natural undergrowth has covered over the site markers.
Just a few weeks before our meeting under the trees, Said was urgently contacted by a farmer whose land lies close to the current Port development. The farmer explained to Said how earlier that day he had found part of his land bulldozed. The operators, who were sent by the Port Authority to clear the land, told the farmer that they were assured that “nobody lives there”.
Issues around land rights have been a source of growing tensions in the area since the Lapsset development began. Farmers and local communities haveof claiming their land. This issue is compounded by the lack of land rights for the indigenous occupants. Said tells us that many farmers in the area are aware that they will be giving up their land to the port development and that there is nothing that can be done about it.
Tired and dusty from our trip to visit the Lamu farmers, I start to think about roads. In Mokowe, where new government buildings have been erected to support the port development, the tarring of a small stretch of road was a cause of curiosity and delight for local inhabitants, who all wanted to experience what it felt like to drive on a smooth surface. But roads are only built for one purpose, to connect one thing to another.
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