By REUBEN OLITA
May 1, 2026| They came asking for calm. They left with a verdict of betrayal.
Residents of Changara Division in Teso North Constituency have torn into a joint “peace call” issued by area leaders Oku Kaunya, Okiya Omtatah, and Catherine Omanyo, branding it not a solution but a surrender.
In a blistering rejoinder, the community refused to lay down their grievance simply because they were asked to.
“Peace without answers is not peace. It is surrender,” said Cleophas Okisai, an Angurai East Ward MP aspirant speaking for the residents. “You have asked a wounded community to remain calm, yet you have not addressed the wound.”
The leaders’ Thursday statement urged wananchi to maintain calm amid protracted boundary disputes between Busia and Bungoma counties. But residents fired back with three sharp demands before any truce talk can be taken seriously.
First: land documentation. What concrete steps have been taken to compel the Ministry of Lands and IEBC to release ownership papers for Changara Location? Residents want dates, reference numbers, and parliamentary question records. “Do not wave peace at us while our title deeds are held hostage.”
Second: boundary beacons. Where exactly does the official line between Busia and Bungoma lie? Residents demand specific villages, GPS coordinates, and the date of the last IEBC survey. “You cannot ask us to keep peace on a line you cannot show us.”
Third: parliamentary action on alleged encroachment by John Waluke. Residents demand Hansard records of motions, statements, or questions raised. “Silence is complicity.”
The rebuke landed hardest on Teso North MP Oku Kaunya, whose mandate is the territory’s defence. “There is no record in Hansard of you addressing Changara encroachment,” Okisai charged. “Calling for peace while your neighbour’s flag stands on our soil is not leadership. It is neutrality to injustice.”
Kaunya has been given until May 5, 2026, to table a formal question to the CS Lands and IEBC and make the Order Paper public.
Woman Representative Catherine Omanyo, once commended for defending Changara in Parliament, was told: “You taught us to pick up the spear. Do not drop it now for a joint communiqué.” She is expected to move a motion of adjournment to have Changara debated as a matter of urgent national importance.
Residents have drawn a hard line. No more declarations. Only documentation. No peace without justice. “Peace is the fruit of justice. You cannot harvest peace where you have not planted truth.”
They have given their leaders seven days to respond with written documentation and annexures.
“Wananchi are not children to be pacified with lullabies,” the statement reads. “Do not tell us to keep peace. Tell us you have kept your oath.”
Charity, they reminded their leaders, begins at home. So does defence of home. And so does accountability.