Businessmen located along Pokomo lane in Nairobi's industry area are demanding Ksh 5 million from Nairobi Metropolitan Service (NMS) and City Hall.
Samar Al Kindy, a representative of the business community appeared before the Nairobi County Assembly Transport and Public Works Committee on Friday, October 16, and laid out their grievances.
Their tiff with the NMS team stems from their move to install cabro paving on their access road in 2019, which the Major General Badi-led team have since ordered removed.
According to their representative, the group had been given the go ahead by City Hall to repair the access road that was in a dilapidated state.
"If they must remove our cabro and do that bridge, they must compensate us. Since it's a public road we didn't expect compensation,
"If the county knew they were going to do a bridge and extend it to the road, then they shouldn't have let us spend all that money," Kindy argued.
NMS Transport Chief Officer Engineer Frederick Karanja, in a letter dated July 10, ordered the residents to remove the cabro in 7 days or risk losing them during the erection of a bridge in the area.
In April 2020, photojournalist and activist Boniface Mwangi highlighted the plight of many Nairobi residents when it came to the conditions of the roads they had to use on a daily basis.
He re-shared a list showing contributions of residents of Utawala in a bid to repair the Kincar-Airways road. What he pointed out as irritating was that their projection for the total cost was just Ksh 400,000. They had managed to raise Ksh 71,000 in the shared list.
To compound the matter, the Kenya Urban Roads Authority (KURA) was roped into the shameful matter, only for the it to lay the blame squarely on the Machakos County government.
"Kindly note KURA is currently doing Utawala-Kincar-Githunguri road which is under Nairobi County. The project was as a result of a joint initiative between KURA and Nairobi County. Talks are ongoing between KURA and Machakos County to also tarmac Kincar-Zebra road," the authority responded at the time.
