President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Sh400 Billion Galana-Kulalu irrigation project is under threat after Kilifi Governor Amason Kingi pledged to split it into two.
Speaking at Bamba trading centre in Ganze, Governor Kingi stated that he would reclaim the Galana part of the Galana-Kulalu irrigation scheme if re-elected.
“If there was a good idea the Jubilee government bore, it was the Galana-Kulalu irrigation project...We must take over this project as a county...this I will do once re-elected,” affirmed Kingi.
Kingi challenged President Kenyatta to relinquish the Galana project if agriculture was a fully devolved function and witness how it would be transformed by the county.
“If Uhuru knows agriculture was fully devolved why is he still holding on to the multi-billion shilling Galana-Kulalu irrigation project? Let him give the project to the respective counties and see if Kilifi and Tana River people will starve anymore,” posed Kingi.
He promised to rally his Tana River counterpart Hussein Dado to lobby for the devolution of the project.
“I wanted to undertake a similar project on Galana River but the government refused, claiming we could not use the same river for another irrigation project. The excuse was that it would threaten the existence of the river,” said Kingi.
The governor accused the government of using the project as a cash cow and noted that it was a game changer in matters food security.
Kingi lamented that the Jubilee government had used the project to achieve other motives other than making the country food secure and questioned the amount of money pumped into the project in relation to what was produced.
President Kenyatta had on March 14, expressed anger at how Kingi has been attacking national government projects in his county and asked the Governor to stick to his lane.
Kenyatta urged Kingi to instead work towards fostering development in the county instead of hurling insults at the Jubilee administration.
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