NAIROBI, Kenya, Jan 15 – When Reuben Mwangi talks about the new road beside Kiine Girls High School, his voice carries both disbelief and pride.
Born and raised in Gatithi village, Kirinyaga County, Mwangi remembers a time when even a wheelbarrow could not pass after rain.
“Since I was born, I knew this road was not here before,” he says. “When it rained, water would be stagnant on the road… we had to carry things on our shoulders to the tarmac.”
For years, villagers found shortcuts through the church or school compound next to the road, abandoning the muddy path altogether. Yet when the school fenced its land, the community made a decision that would change everything.
“We gave up our land here to create this road,” Mwangi explains.
At first, the idea of tarmac in a rural village felt unreal. “We had never seen a tarmac road going into rural areas,” he says. “We only used to see tractors coming to cultivate farms… not to build roads. We thought this was just a dream.”
The road matters most to Kiine Girls High School, which sits barely one and a half kilometres from the main road but had long been cut off during rainy seasons.
According to Chief Principal Jane Nyawira Waweru, the school was “very near yet very far.”
“The soils would just be on the road. The buses could not access the school,” she says. “Parents would ask, ‘are we going or not going to school?’ especially if it rains.”
In addition, suppliers avoided the school. Emergency vehicles could not reach it. Teachers arrived muddy and exhausted while students trudged long distances to make it to the school.
That reality changed on April 26, when Deputy President Prof. Kithure Kindiki commissioned the Kiine Secondary School Access Road, an 820-metre, bitumen-standard stretch built by KeNHA under the Kenol–Sagana Road Project.
Mwangi still remembers the day clearly. “I was standing here,” he says. “I felt happy because we have been given a road, and it’s something I can see. It’s not something I’m being promised.”
For the school, the impact was immediate. “What used to take one hour now takes 20 minutes walking,” the Chief Principal says. “By car, it is about five minutes.”
Beyond access, the road restored dignity. “The school had many names that were not pleasant,” she says. “But today we are happy that even our girls are very clean.”
Mwangi and his neighbours now say that the road is proof that sacrifice can shape the future. “He did well for us,” he says of the Deputy President. “All of us say thank you. We are grateful.”
