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Farmers Ditch KPCU Over Pay
- Details
- Published on Sunday, 22 July 2007 23:15
Shareholders of Bishembe, Mabariri, Nyakenimo and Eyaka factories resolved to operate independently during a stormy general meeting attended by officials of the Coffee Board of Kenya, KPCU and the Ministry of Co-operative Development on Wednesday.
They identified Thika Millers as their agent to auction their crop. They said they will also no longer be an affiliate of the giant Kisii Farmers Co-operative Union whose headquarters is in Kisii town.
At one time, the meeting chaired by the district co-operative officer, Mr C. A. Matoke, almost degenerated into chaos when those opposed to the split were attacked by the splinter group, who were the majority, forcing them to flee.
Riot police, who mounted tight security throughout the meeting, managed to maintain calm and enabled the meeting to continue.
Angry farmers did not allow officials, who were against the split, to address them. They included the Kisii Farmers Cooperative Union general manager, Mr Robert Mainya, Coffee Board of Kenya regional manager, Mr William Epaye and KPCU branch manager, Mr Joe Maina.
The planters picked a nine-member committee to work out modalities of sharing fixed assets and liabilities in their Eyaka Co-operative Society.
Mr Njoro Masigwa will be the committee chairman, Mr David Chweya (vice-chairman), Mr James Marita (treasurer) and Mr Francis Ongwenyi (secretary).
Reading the farmers' grievances, Mr Masigwa said KPCU had killed farmers' morale by not paying them regularly. He said the payments were too low, and in this era of liberalisation, "there was no need to sell the crop to a miller offering low prices".
He accused the management committee of Eyaka Coffee Society of embezzling farmers' funds worth millions of shillings through unprocedural tendering or procuring of firm inputs and electrification programmes in the affected factories.
The society's chairman, Mr Henry Nyang'au, his assistant Paul Ondieki and treasurer Moses Manani claimed they inherited the society's woes from their predecessors. The four factories have over 8,000 shareholders, most of who have become dormant after uprooting their crop due to poor payments and alleged mismanagement of their society's affairs.
