"Property rights are still wretchedly insecure in Africa"

COSMAS MURUNGA was always proud to show off his mud-walled home, set in a clearing on the wooded slopes of Mount Elgon; to explain how his people coexisted with, and cared for, the forest and its wildlife on the border with Uganda. But that home is no more, burnt to the ground by around 50 Kenya Forest Service (KFS) rangers and police, along with 200 other dwellings, on June 20th and 21st. “We lost everything,” he says.