Classification of land as per the new Constitution of Kenya

  

Date Posted: 1/14/2013 4:32:26 AM

Posted By: SalChep  Membership Level: Silver  Total Points: 284

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The chapter on land in the Constitution is Chapter Five Part 1 which covers Article 69 through to 68.
Article 61(2) classifies land as public, community or private land. Article 62 goes on to lay out what falls under the category of public land. These are:
a) Land which was unalienated government land at the time the Constitution came into force as laid out in the Act that was in force at the time.
b) All land that is lawfully held, used or occupied by any State organ except under a private lease.
c) Land transferred to the State either by sale, reversion or surrender.
d) Land whose legal ownership cannot be proved to be either of an individual or a community.
e) Land whose heir cannot be established legally.
f) All minerals and mineral oils.
g) Government forests (other than those used by specific communities as community forests) government reserves,water catchment areas, national parks, government animal sanctuaries and specially protected areas.
h) All roads as provided for by an Act of Parliament.
i) All rivers, lakes and other water bodies as defined by an Act of Parliament.
j) The territorial sea, the exclusive economic zone and the sea bed.
k) The continental shelf
l) All land between the high and low water marks.
m) Any land not classified as either private or community land
n) Any other land declared to be public land by an Act of Parliament.

Article 63 establishes what falls under the category of community land. This is:
a) Land lawfully registered in the name of group representatives

b) Land lawfully transferred to a specific community by any process of law
c) Any other land declared community land by an Act of Parliament
d) Land that is:
i) lawfully held, managed or used by specific communities as community forests, grazing areas or shrines
ii) ancestral land and land occupied by traditionally hunter-gatherer communities
iii) lawfully held as trust land by the county governments.

Article 64 lays out the categories that fall under private land as:
a) Registered land held by any person under any freehold tenure
b) Land held by any person under leasehold tenure
c) Any other land declared private under a relevant Act of Parliament.

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