NAIROBI, Kenya, Aug 30 – Jimi Wanjigi, the businessman-cum-politician, who until recently was known as a political strategist and financier behind the 2013 and 2017 presidential campaigns on Sunday the Standard Guage Railway was initially projected to cost just Sh55 billion from Mombasa to Malaba.
Wanjigi, who claimed he birthed the plan in 2008, said he was surprised that the project ended up costing more than Sh300 billion, and only run from Mombasa to Nairobi, at nearly 60 times the projected cost.
“SGR was a projected birthed by me in 2008 with the same company China Road and Bridge Corporation. We spent money on feasibility and technical studies, and what I recall of the project is that it was to cost was Sh55 billion from Mombasa to Malaba, what happened is that it became Sh300 billion from Mombasa to Nairobi,” said Wanjigi.
He was speaking during an interview with Citizen TV where he also announced his plans to transform Kenya if elected President in next year’s General Elections.
The businessman also revealed that the plan was to have the project was to be undertaken through a public-private partnership arrangement, and funding was also to be private.
He said the adoption of the plan into a government-funded project led to an unsutainable accumulation of debt.
Wanjigi said government’s role in the whole project was to provide land which they were to lease –like a real estate project.
“The intention was that rail was going to be private nothing to do with government. As a businessman I wanted to use private money, the intention was not to take any taxpayers money for this project. Debt which we have today for that railway is phenomenal,” he stated.
The businessman also admitted his involved in other government projects including the Thika Super Highway, saying he was acting as an agent to companies that were constructing the highway.
“I am an agent of companies and development projects both inside and outside Kenya and those are the big projects. I am business man and Business men find solutions to problems,” he said.
