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{
    "id": 397028,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/397028/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 256,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "within the constituencies. In my county, for example, there is a road from Embul Bul to Ongata Rongai which is a Class E road. The road between Ongata Rongai and Kitengela is also a Class E road. We also have many other roads which are not classified. These are roads which are nine metres in width. Most of these roads are known to the leadership and the people of the counties. To me, these are the county roads. It is good to know how the Ministry of Roads used to operate before the enactment of the current Constitution. There existed the District Roads Officers who used to maintain and do the construction of all roads within those former districts which currently are our counties. At that time, those officers used to be answerable to the Provincial Engineers who used to make sure that all the districts within that province were under those officers. We also used to have the Chief Engineer Roads who used to own all the roads in the country. Through an Act of Parliament in 2007, road construction and maintenance was transferred to various authorities. That is how the Kenya National Highways Authority (KeNHA) which specializes in maintaining and constructing the national trunk roads; the Class A, B and C, came into being. Then there is also the Kenya Urban Roads Authority (KURA) which maintains those roads which are within the cities and municipalities. Up to now, the same authorities are still in place. There is also KeRRA which was mandated to maintain and construct the county roads. Every county has a regional manager in the management structure of KeRRA. This regional manager has officers in every constituency called Roads Officers. KeRRA is mainly in charge of Class E, D and unclassified roads. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, as per the Constitution, those roads are under the management of the counties. The leadership of the counties knows which roads need to be done. They know which roads to give priority. The regional managers of KeRRA have a databank of all the roads. They know how many kilometres, for example, of Class E, D and unclassified roads exist in a particular constituency. The unclassified roads keep on coming up on a daily basis. Since the structure of KeRRA is within the counties, it is easier to pay attention to the roads than before when they had to report to Nairobi. A regional manager, for example, for Kajiado made a request for the road connecting Oltepesi up to Nadile which is just 30 kilometres to be done and that request has taken more than three years. In fact, there is even a dispensary along that road which was destroyed by floods. We should devolve KeRRA and collapse all the functions to the county government. These functions can be done by the executive officer in charge of infrastructure at the county. All counties must not make their requests to Nairobi whereas those are roads which are known. Just before the budgets were done in most of the counties – the Senators can bear me witness – governors promised to tarmac a number of roads within their counties. They can only do that if we allow the county leadership to do those roads. I think this Motion is timely and will pave way for development. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}