Water CS Eugene Wamalwa inspecting the Sh150m GoK/Italian Chesikaki Water Supply Project progress in Mt.Elgon, Bungoma County/COURTESY
NAIROBI, Kenya, Nov 5 – Water Cabinet Secretary Eugene Wamalwa has called on opposition leader Raila Odinga to stop politicising vision 2030 projects.
Wamalwa claims Raila was in government when the water projects he is now calling into question were brought into life and denies that the Jubilee administration has shrouded them in secrecy.
“There were consultations and public participation, there were ecological studies carried out and a NEMA (National Environment Management Authority) license given there was nothing secretive about it, it was something that both the president of Kenya and the prime minister of Italy when he visited the country witnessed the signing of the agreement,” he stated.
Wamalwa says shooting down vision 2030 projects will take the country backwards and has urged the opposition leader to carefully evaluate them.
““We urge Odinga not to turn into a political sniper, because we will never release the vision 2030 if we do not work on the projects,” Wamalwa said on Saturday.
Odinga at a news conference on Friday claimed the construction of Itare Dam to feed towns in Nakuru will turn seven surrounding counties into deserts warning that the project will divert water from the Mau Tower at the expense of Narok, Bomet, Kericho, Kisii, Nyamira, Kisumu and Homa Bay counties.
Odinga therefore demanded that proper public participation be done with all affected counties and President Kenyatta give an assurance that he has no personal interest in this project.
Odinga claimed that the project will also kill the Sondu-Miriu dam and turn it into a white elephant.
This is the second water Project Odinga has opposed in the last two months.
In the recent past, Odinga spoke out against the Northern Collector Tunnel project in the Aberdares Mountains, just above the Murang’a region, whose impact he claims, will be one of the most disastrous in the country and on residents of the Continent.
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