Kenyan court ruling highlights legal safeguards against unauthorised land transfers

A court in Kenya has highlighted a legal step landowners can take to protect their property from unauthorised transfers, after a family discovered that land belonging to a deceased relative had been registered in another person's name years after his death.

Under the Land Registration Act, a person with a legitimate interest in land can lodge a caution against the property to prevent certain dealings from being registered without their consent or a court order. A restriction can also be sought where there are concerns over fraud, improper dealings or another sufficient reason, and it can limit or prevent transactions while the issue is addressed.

The case involved a landowner who died in 1971, with the court finding that another person was registered as proprietor of the property about 11 years later. The family discovered the registration in 2014, reported the matter to the police and lodged a restriction at the Land Registry, which remained in place as the dispute was pursued through various institutions and eventually before the court.

In a judgment delivered by Justice M.A. Odeny, the court found no evidence explaining how the property had moved from the deceased owner to the person subsequently registered as proprietor, and no evidence of succession proceedings or lawful authority allowing the transfer. It declared the disputed registrations unlawful, fraudulent, null and void, and ordered the Land Registrar to cancel the entries and revert the property to the deceased owner's estate.

The ruling underlines that winning a land case requires parties to establish, step by step, how the law was breached and to support claims with documentary evidence and credible testimony. Landowners are advised to keep ownership and succession documents safe, conduct official land searches and act quickly when an unexplained transaction appears on the register.