Transport Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen on Wednesday attributed the stalling of road projects over the last nine financial years to insufficient funding.
Speaking during an interview with Spice FM, Murkomen claimed that his ministry has struggled with budget constraints, especially for the road department, this he said has derailed some of the road projects.
"The Ministry of has never secured sufficient funding for the last nine years, especially the Department of Roads. It (the department) has never been allocated the amount of money commensurate to the projects it committed to doing."
The CS said the Ministry's insufficient budget allocation, budget cuts and late disbursement has greatly hampered service delivery, leaving ministry officials in limbo on how best to proceed to deliver on key projects.
According to Murkomen, every year the Ministry has been running on shortfalls, making it hard to embark on new projects.
"I think we dropped the ball somewhere, maybe even those nine years, if we had moved progressively, Kenyans would have understood but once we moved rapidly, they believed that we had the resources to rejuvenate the stalled projects."
The CS however stated that his Ministry is keen on rejuvenating stalled road projects before commissioning new ones. This is a strategy that the Ministry is confident will allow the government to see to it that all stalled projects are completed.
"We never started new projects, the new projects are either those in support of development partners or projects related to maintenance."
Instructively, President William Ruto's government had allocated Ksh 193.4 billion for the Roads Department in the 2024/2025 budget.
Treasury CS Njuguna Ndung'u stated that the financing would cater for the construction and maintenance of roads across the country.
From the allocation, Ksh 69.5 billion had been set aside for road rehabilitation.
Meanwhile, Ksh 2.4 billion was allocated towards the ongoing Dongo Kundu bypass project. The Nairobi Bus Rapid Transit project was lined up to receive Ksh 1 billion.
Prof Ndung'u, while reading the budget estimates in June, said a total of Ksh 29.6 billion will be set aside for the expansion of railway transport, Ksh 12.1 billion for air transport and Ksh 3.1 billion for marine mobility.
Development of Nairobi Railway City had been allocated Ksh 239.4 million while Ksh 200 million was allocated to the requisition of ferries for use on Lake Victoria.
The funds however are lower than what was allocated for the sector in the 2023/2024 budget.
Last year, for instance, road construction, maintenance, and rehabilitation were allocated Ksh 244.9 billion, funds slightly higher than what has been allocated this time round.
The CS says inconsistency in fund allocation, and budget cuts have led to the stalling of projects.
