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Because of the Ministry of Endowment and the Agrarian Reform Corporation, Yemen Egyptian warriors are loosing their lands and facing eviction and displacement
The LCHR has received complaints from a number of citizens from Kafr El Sharna – Qalubeya governorate, stating that they were soldiers in the Yemen war, and that late President Gamal Abdel Nasser has issued a decision for all the soldiers who took part in the Yemen war to receive 5 feddans of land or a governmental employment, and because of the limited are of land in their village, each soldier was to receive 2 feddans of land. In June 1992, the agrarian reform corporation issued ownership contracts to only 14 soldiers, which made the rest of the soldiers kept sending complaints to the corporation. After 5 years, the corporation said that the Ministry of Endowment is the body assigned or this matter. The Endowment gave the farmers pieces of land and obligated them to pay rents for it as tenants, but the complainers refused to pay rents because they have already paid certain amounts of money to the agrarian reform corporation in order to own these lands, which made the Endowment file a sequestration lawsuit against them demanding that they pay rents for these lands, and there were a number of court decisions with the imprisonment of some of these farmers. The complainers have filed a lawsuit against the Ministers of Endowment and Agriculture through the LCHR, which will be discussed on15/11/2006.
The LCHR sees that these farmers were victims of swindle and deception by these two governmental authorities, as both of them are manipulating farmers rights and are trying to seize their lands.
The LCHR has filed a lawsuit demanding the Ministry of Endowment and the agrarian reform corporation to stop the sequestration process and allow these farmers to own their lands especially that they were old warriors and now they are aged farmers, and this land is their only source of income.
For more information, please contact the Center.