Caption: A bulldozer at work in Mutomo area, Kitui South. Residents remain optimistic after construction of the long-ignored Kibwezi-Mutomo-Kitui began. (Lawrence Kioko/hivisasa.com)Residents of Ukambani counties of Kitui and Makueni are upbeat after the beginning of activities to construct the controversial Kibwezi-Mutomo-Kitui road.
The locals have expressed optimism that the key road, whose construction President Uhuru Kenyatta commissioned in December last year, would spur the region’s economy by opening it up for investment.
Sinohydro Corporation, a Chinese engineering and road construction firm, which was contracted by the State to upgrade the road to bitumen standards, is on the ground and has started uprooting trees to pave way for the roadworks.
Agnes Mutua, a businesswoman in Mutomo town, said the road will ease transportation of commodities and boost trade across the region by linking it to the Northern corridor once tarmacked.
She said the current poor state of the road has left traders counting losses following high transport costs besides damage of goods along the potholed murram road.
Michael Musembi, a driver plying the Kitui-Mutomo route, regretted that rains usually worsen the situation as vehicles bog down for hours, paralysing transportation along the busy route.
“We spend a large part of our incomes on repairs since our vehicles break down frequently owing to the pathetic condition of the road,” he lamented.
The residents are also hoping to reap big from the multi-billion project since President Kenyatta urged the contractor to ensure the locals, especially youth, are given priority in hiring of road workers.
“This road will bring down transport costs and trigger extensive investments leading to creation of employment for the jobless population in the region and beyond,” the Head of State said during the launch at Mutomo.
The president said construction of the road, which runs from Kibwezi (Makueni County) through Ikutha, Mutomo, Kitui and Kabati to Migwani towns, will cost Sh18.4 billion and is expected to end by June 2010.
Local leaders, with Senator David Musila on the forefront, have in the past led the residents in peaceful demonstrations to lobby for tarmacking of the road which successive regimes ignored.
The 192-kilometre road remains as the only class B7 road in the country which has remained untarmacked since independence.