MOMBASA, Kenya -- Worshippers at a village mosque in Kenya are fighting a developer's plans to tear the house of worship down and build a shop on the land.

"This is the only place of worship in Bonje. Muslims will have nowhere to say their prayers," the imam, Ustadh Rajab Tayari, told The Nation, a newspaper in Nairobi.

The developer has offered either financial compensation or a new mosque at another site. But the villagers say that the building is convenient for everyone in Bonje, a village near the port of Mombasa.

Edwin Chabarri, the district officer, visited Bonje and told the villagers Thursday that the developer has a valid title to the mosque site. He advised them to use the courts and warned them not to take the law into their own hands.

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