Kenya: Private sectors on process to be tapped by govt for expanding road network

Kenya is planning to tap the private sector's financial and technical skills with an intention to increase the country's road network, a senior government official said on May 10.

James Wainaina Macharia, cabinet secretary in the Ministry of Transport, Infrastructure, Housing and Urban Development, told a media briefing in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi that the bulk of classified roads remain unpaved due to budgetary constraints.

"Under the road annuity program, the private sector will design and finance construction of roads and the government commits to reimburse the contractors through periodic payments over a long period of time," James Macharia said when the Kenya Urban Roads Authority signed two public-private partnerships to develop and rehabilitate roads in the central and western regions, Xinhua noted.

Macharia further said that the road annuity program was approved by the Cabinet with an objective to develop and rehabilitate 10,000 kilometres roads all over the country by procuring long term contracts for the design, finance, construction and maintenance of all identified roads.

The government of Kenya said that the program will link payments to the private sector to completion of roads and performance based on maintenance. Macharia revealed that the period annuity payments to the road contractors will be made from the Roads Annuity Fund.

As the Kenyan government wants to augment the success rate of road annuity program, it will be responsible for provision of right of way for the project while the private contractor will finance, operate and maintain roads for a period of ten years after which it will transfer the road networks back to the state, as reported by Xinhua.

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