•Kachapin had served one term before he was defeated by outgoing governor Professor John Lonyangapuo. He was reelected and resumed work.
•Same was true for Cheboi who lost to Kiptis but has make a major come back and will finnish his pprojects..
Image: COURTESY
Two former governors, Simon Kachapin of West Pokot and Benjamin Cheboi of Baringo, have made big political comebacks, picking up where they left off.
Both won on UDA tickets.
Kachapin had served one term before he was defeated by outgoing Governor Professor John Lonyangapuo but he defeated him on August 9.
The same was true for Cheboi who lost to outgoing Governor Stanley Kiptis but made a major comeback.
Cheboi and Kachapin were reelected through UDA and with support from President-elect William Ruto.
“I thank residents of Baringo for giving me a chance to complete the work I started before it was disrupted in the last five years. I will build on what has been done to further develop our great county”, Cheboi said.
Baringo has faced major challenges including drought, floods and insecurity which have affected lives in more than half of the county.
Cheboi returns to find a full in-tray because the drought and insecurity challenges have also affected education and many other projects financed by the county.
“We will work with communities, the national government and other stakeholders and neighbouring counties to ensure that we find lasting solutions to the insecurity and drought problems affecting our people”, Cheboi said.
Cheboi said while he was out of leadership for the last five years he learnt a lot on how best he will work with residents to achieve major objectives including alleviation of poverty and illiteracy.
In West Pokot, Kachapin had in his first five years initiated tens of projects which remain incomplete. The projects in the education sector, agriculture and water sectors have been cited in audit reports but were not completed by outgoing governor Lonyangapuo.
“We will consolidate all efforts to ensure that we invest resources in completing all pending projects in our county. We do not need to waste resources on many new projects yet what we started is still useful for our people.”Kachapin said.
Being the old guard with wide experience, either Kachapin or Cheboi will take over leadership of the North Rift Economic Bloc (Noreb). Outgoing Uasin Gishu governor Jackson Mandago has been chairman of Noreb.
Noreb was formed by the eight counties in the North Rift region to coordinate joint cross border development projects which can benefit residents of the region.
The bloc has however remained dormant with no joint projects initiated in the last10 years.
(Edited by V. Graham