Usoma village. Located on the shores of Lake Victoria in Kisumu County. This is where Mr Osir Akelo was buried 31 years ago. His wife, Monica Ochieng, who died 13 years ago, is also buried here.

The two were laid to rest. However, Osir and his wife haven’t rest in peace for the past 31 and 13 years, respectively. This was after the villagers started illegal sand harvesting in the area.

‘’The whole of this area was at the height that you can see the grave was higher. Now there is a lot of sand harvesting taking place around this place which started way back in around 1980. The kind of degradation we are witnessing here today is a result of sand harvesting. When people were harvesting sand for commercial purposes. They were harvesting without caring about the devastating effects that will be there later. Some of the effects are the hanging graves and land degradation. Some of the graves are actually sinking’’, said Micheal Otieno, an environmentalist with Mangnum organization based in Kisumu.

 

Initially, this was a homestead before it was converted into a cemetery with over 200 people already buried in this land. Interestingly, the people who led the illegal sand harvesting were mr Osir’s family members, particularly his sons. After Mr. Osir’s family and other villagers gained economically from the proceeds of illegal harvesting, they left the site leaving some graves hanging while others would later sink even deeper.

‘’The locals and the sons were the people harvesting sand. Where we are today, was actually a homestead. Traditionally, the Luo community used to bury parents near the home compound. The two graves behind me were the owner and one of the wives of this homestead. This tells you this was a family home.’’ Added mr Nyaguti.

From a distance, while visiting the area you would think the place has a dam, only to realize they are open graves full of stagnant water.

Micheal Otieno Nyaguti, a resident of the area and an environmentalist, says poverty was the main cause of illegal sand mining. The villagers would later sell the sand for their economic purposes. However, Mr Nyaguti has entirely blamed local leaders and security apparatus for aiding the land degradation exercise in the Usoma location.

‘’The people around were able to do this because they were only interested in money. Some were even doing it but were not happy that they were exposing their relatives to this kind of dehumanizing environment. However, the authorities are the culprits in this because they had the enforcement capacity but they were compromised. A good number were compromised anytime reports were made.  They would come to such places and no environmental assessment would be carried out. Environmental officers, policemen, chiefs, and assistant chiefs would come to this place but receive something small and leave’’ said Mr Nyaguti

According to Nyaguti, the main aim of sand miners was to excavate the entire place but due to customs and cultural beliefs from the local community of disturbing the death, they decided to leave the graves hanging precariously.

Currently, this piece of land is degraded. Nothing can be planted or cultivated. No homestead can be developed as well.

”The only thing that somebody can do if he has land here is to look for soil somewhere and reclaim it by filling and backfilling this area” said Nyaguti.