The former board of the Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA) has been instructed to disband and refrain from interfering with tea reforms.
David Ichoho, chairman of KTDA Holdings, expressed regret for the incident that occurred on Monday at KTDA offices while speaking at the ongoing Nairobi Trade Fair ASK show at the Jamhuri park grounds.
The KTDA office and the respective smallholder tea factories were invaded by the former board, led by the chairman, on September 26. T
Ichoho claimed that after the board was expelled from the office, they are now attempting to retake it by force.
He claimed that they wanted to reverse the progress that had been made.
“We were able to stop that in good time and I want to tell them that they have no space. We have moved on and we want to continue serving the farmers,” he said.
“We have already undertaken the reforms and we want to ensure that the reforms will come to a completion,” Ichoho said.
He said farmers have started benefiting from the reforms.
“We have done policy and other administrative reforms. I will not allow the cartels to come back to the tea sector. We move forward. That was trespassing and we will take legal action and whoever is responsible will be held accountable,” he said.
The current KTDA board, he continued, is advancing the reform agenda and will make sure they collaborate closely with the farmers.
The CEO of KTDA Holdings, Wilson Muthaura, stated that the company is committed to keeping the progress made in the previous year.
“We want to assure farmers that we are aggressively looking for more market, and that tea farming is going to be a very profitable venture,” he said.
Farmers were urged by Muthaura to ignore the former board of directors’ attempts to reverse the progress made by the current board.
