• County engages several contractors in every project and their competition ensures work is done well and timely
• Used funds from the World Bank in road and street lighting projects
Image: COURTESY
Machakos Governor Alfred Mutua says his Maendeleo Chap Chap ideology is improving lives.
The leader of the Maendeleo Chap Chap party on Tuesday said that in Kenya most projects take ages to be completed and the delays lead to increase in costs — sometimes twofold, threefold or even fourfold.
“A road will start being constructed when a young man is in school. The man will leave school, meet another young lady. They will get married, have children and the children will join school before that small stretch of road is completed. That is the Kenyan story everywhere, and the prices keep doubling,” Mutua said.
He said the Machakos government has a unique way of executing development projects within set timelines and budgets.
“We have an ideology called ‘Chap Chap’ (swiftly). We've realised that one of the challenges we have in Kenya is the speed it takes to do things. You find that projects start but they take forever, they never end,” Mutua said.
He spoke at his Machakos town office shortly after meeting with World Bank officials, national government representatives, and officials from the Council of Governors.
The funds his administration received from the World Bank have been well spent for the benefit of residents, he said.
"It's all about improving the lives of our people and making life better for them,” Mutua told the World Bank officials.
He said they implemented road and street lighting projects.
The county chief said Kenyans are not poor but suffer because of improper use of their abundant resources. Project management and logistics abilities are weak and people are not able to do things through, he said.
As a solution to the problem, Machakos engages several contractors in every project and their competition ensures work is done well and timely, Mutua said.
“There are no contractors in Machakos. That's why I give tenders to several of them to do big projects like construction of roads.”
Mutua thanked the World Bank for funding their projects and called for the integration of projects implemented by the county.
(Edited by F'Orieny)