Wiper Patriotic Front leader Kalonzo Musyoka has faulted President William Ruto for kicking Tata Chemicals Limited out of Lake Magadi in Kajiado County.
While concurring with the Head of State that the soda ash mining company had not acted responsibly throughout the years it had been in operation, Mr Musyoka questioned the “opaque” manner in which President Ruto’s administration had moved to pick another company to take over the mining concession.
The former vice-president said President Ruto risked squandering an opportunity to correct historical injustices against the Maasai community, which he said had characterised the mining of soda ash in Lake Magadi since 1904, when the colonial administration negotiated a mining concession.
“Lake Magadi belongs to the people of Kenya, and most immediately to the people of Kajiado County. It was taken from them by an empire. It must not now be traded away by their own government in the dark,” Mr Musyoka said Friday.
He spoke during the burial of former High Court judge Joseph Mbalu Mutava at Kithasyu Primary School in Makueni County.
Mutava once worked at the Central Bank of Kenya. He was married to Kibwezi East MP Jessica Mbalu.
He died two weeks ago after a sudden illness. A postmortem examination has since identified a heart attack as the cause of death. Mourners who graced his funeral hailed him as an astute scholar.
Some of the United Opposition principals used the opportunity to call on President Ruto to reveal the investor who had taken over from Tata Chemicals Limited in mining soda ash from Lake Magadi.
Tata Chemicals Company Magadi factory on June 14, 2025.
Photo credit: Stanley Ngotho | Nation Media Group
DAP-K leader Eugene Wamalwa termed the termination of Tata Chemicals Limited’s concession by President Ruto an illegal roadside declaration.
“He is not above the law,” he said, as Mr Musyoka said President Ruto’s indictment of Tata Chemicals Limited, which he had outlined on Thursday, was valid. The Head of State said the Indian chemical company had failed to generate enough benefits for Kenya for the decades it had been in the soda ash mining business.
Mr Musyoka said Tata should have set up a glass-making factory in the country, as well as an industrial training college and a university at Magadi Township to transfer industrial skills and technology.
“Tata Chemicals Limited fell short, especially on the transfer of skills and technology that would have made Kenyans the masters and not merely the labourers of their own soda ash,” he said.
“Our quarrel is not with the diagnosis but with the Ruto prescription,” Mr Musyoka said as he piled pressure on President Ruto to name the company which has taken over from Tata Chemicals Limited.
“We have asked, repeatedly, and no name has been given. No company has been gazetted. No beneficial ownership has been disclosed. No competitive process has been published. No valuation has been tabled. No ratification has been sought from Parliament,” he said.
He added that President Ruto should have waited for active court cases touching on Tata Chemicals Limited’s operations in Lake Magadi before announcing the kicking out of the Indian chemical company.
Mr Musyoka insinuated that President Ruto had kicked out the Indian mining company because he was plotting to benefit from the resource.
“Someone is definitely looking at the value of lithium and other minerals in the Lake Magadi area. They want to get that and a chunk of the 240,000 acres of Lake Magadi land,” he said.
In a bid to validate the concession, Mr Musyoka advised Tata Chemicals Limited to consider ceding at least 40,000 acres of the Lake Magadi land to the Maasai community “and pay the Sh17.4 billion they owe to the Kajiado County government. Thereafter, they will have a valid lease up to 2053,” he said.
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