- Sugar farmers await clarity on delayed Kenya Sugar Board elections
- Farmers reject a proposal for Parliament to appoint board directors
- Upper Western farmers rally behind their preferred candidate for the seat
Kenya’s sugar farmers are eagerly awaiting an election date for their preferred director as the High Court prepares to determine consolidated cases challenging the Kenya Sugar Board (KSB) elections.
A three-judge bench, chaired by Chief Justice Martha Koome, has been constituted to hear the cases.
The Parliamentary Committee on Trade, Industrialisation and Cooperatives has been visiting millers and farmers within cane growing regions to gather views on how the sugar sector is faring. The visits have elicited farmer concerns over the delayed KSB elections.
Led by Ikolomani MP Bernard Shinali, the committee’s chairman, the team is engaging farmers and millers on how best the sugar industry can be managed and made more beneficial to both millers and farmers.
During a meeting in Butali, expectations of both millers and farmers were openly discussed. It emerged that the government might be considering appointing five directors to represent the Lower Western, Upper, Southern, Central and Coastal catchment areas, as the filed lawsuits continue to drag on.
Farmers reject proposal for parliament to appoint directors
A suggestion by the parliamentary committee, seeking millers’ and farmers’ consent to have Parliament appoint the directors, was quickly rejected.
Farmers, through their representatives, quashed the proposal, accusing the government of attempting to coerce them into agreeing to the appointment system. They further alleged that the government is sponsoring non-farmers to file numerous lawsuits with large sums of money.
According to farmer representatives present at the meeting, the government is behind many of the 10 lawsuits filed so far over the KSB elections and the constitution and boundaries of catchment areas.
Butali Sugarcane Farmers Association chairman William Kopi said court cases are being sponsored at a cost of up to Ksh500,000.
“We have ten or even more cases filed by mostly non-farmers who have vested interests in the sugar sector and are ready to see to it that the much-anticipated KSB elections are not held, so that they can continue enjoying cheap sugar imports and weakening local production and the market,” Kopi said.
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Butali Sugar Mills Managing Director Sanjay Patel, addressing the same trade committee panel, also rejected the proposal to have Parliament appoint directors to represent farmers, noting that farmers’ interests would not be catered for.
Responding, committee chairman Bernard Shinali said he noted that both the miller and the farmer appeared to hold the same position on the KSB elections.
Farmers said they already had a candidate in waiting and were only awaiting the courts to set an election date.
Meanwhile, cane farmers from Upper Western have continued to back Dr Ronald Inyangala as their preferred representative, describing him as unbiased and committed to serving them diligently.
Speaking after the court ruling constituting the three-judge bench, the farmers vowed to stand by Inyangala after establishing that some aspiring directors were affiliated with either millers or sugar barons and would therefore not be free to serve farmers’ interests if elected.
The farmers alleged that the sponsored court cases were a plot by some business people to exhaust aspirants’ campaign funds, forcing them to surrender and pave way for sponsored candidates who would then serve millers’ or sugar barons’ interests instead.
They said they understood and agreed with Inyangala’s manifesto, describing it as tailored to serve the common farmer.
“We have read and understood what his manifesto entails, and we are satisfied that he is fighting for the rights of cane farmers — the issue of having our cane pay us more. He has promised to push for extra payment on other by-products besides sucrose, including bagasse, which produces electricity; filter mud, which is used as fertiliser; and molasses, which produces ethanol. With the soon-to-be-launched distillery at West Kenya Sugar Factory creating employment opportunities, we farmers will have every reason to reap huge benefits from our sugarcane plantations,” said Cosmas Wanjala, a farmer.
The Kabras area, home to two factories, Butali and West Kenya, has over 13,000 registered cane farmers and is expected to be a key battleground in determining who wins the Upper Western Kenya Sugar Board director position.
Inyangala pushes for mobile weighbridges
Inyangala is also being backed for his efforts to introduce mobile weighbridges at farms or designated areas, where farmers can access and verify the tonnage of their cane before it is delivered to the factory for crushing.
He says cane farming is the only viable cash crop that, if well nurtured, can uplift the livelihoods of cane farmers in the region, especially under the Sugar Act of 2024, which gives the board powers to determine and set cane pricing. He intends to properly utilise these powers to ensure farmers are paid their rightful dues.
By Wakhungu Andaje
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