How NYS more than doubled cost of building slum road

What you need to know:

The Kenya Urban Roads Authority (Kura) had planned to spend Sh326 million on the same road before the NYS took it over.
The NYS spent Sh791 million on construction of the road - a figure that is described as unrealistic given that the youth agency had the machinery and personnel to do the work.

The Sh791 million that the National Youth Service (NYS) spent on the construction of a 3.5 kilometre road in Nairobi’s Kibera slums was more than double the actual cost, the Kenya Urban Roads Authority (Kura) has said.

Silas Kinoti, the acting Kura director-general, told the National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that the agency had planned to spend Sh326 million on the same road before the NYS took it over.

Mr Kinoti said Kura had initially intended to spend a total of Sh326 million, including the cost of materials and other overheads, on building the Kibera road through the Ministry of Land and Urban Development.

“I see the cost of Sh791 million on a 3.5 kilometre road as unrealistic from a professional point of view,” he said. It has emerged that the NYS spent Sh791 million on dry materials used to build the road whose construction remains incomplete.

Mr Kinoti described the NYS’s spending on the 3.25 kilometre road as unrealistic given that the youth agency had the machinery and personnel to do the work.

Besides, he said the NYS worked on the project using a force account where it procured the materials and delivered to the site based on the schedules of dry material prepared by Kura.

Mr Kinoti told the committee chaired by Rarieda MP Nicholas Gumbo that a schedule of dry materials is used in situations where the implementing agency does not factor in overheads and profits to its costs.

The NYS was solely responsible for the sourcing and procurement of construction materials as well as the provision of labour for the works, the Kura boss said, adding that his agency was not party to the procurement of materials, contractors or subcontractors.

Kura did not also verify the quantities of materials delivered to the site.

Mr Kinoti said Kura did not recommend any suppliers of construction materials for the Kibera road even as he declined to “guarantee the proficiency or quality of the contractors procured by NYS”.

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A team of Kura engineers and surveyors in liaison with staff from the Materials Department of the Ministry of Transport, Infrastructure, Housing and Urban Development was, however, to oversee and monitor the construction works and subsequently prepare monthly progress reports.

It was also Kura’s mandate to ensure that all materials and the executed works complied with the set specifications, Mr Kinoti said.

“Kura’s mandate was to provide designs and schedules of dry materials required for construction of the road,” he said, adding that the NYS was mandated to prepare the cost of the works based on the schedule of dry materials provided by Kura. PAC sought to know whether payment of Sh791 million for the Kibera Access Road was irregular given that it would translate to Sh280 million per kilometre.

The committee also sought to know whether Kura engineers were involved in the construction of the road and the proficiency of the engineers involved.

Mr Kinoti said it would be difficult to know the total cost of any construction works when one is not in control of materials and labour.

Suba MP John Mbadi asked Mr Kinoti to explain why Kura, which is mandated by an Act of Parliament to maintain and construct roads in urban areas, abdicated its responsibility to the NYS.

“You allowed politics that saw NYS take over construction of the road which falls under your mandate and the result is the loss of Sh791 million,” Mr Mbadi said.

Balambala MP Abdikadir Aden demanded to know the category of the road, saying a kilometre of the 58km Eldoret-Webuye Road classified as TO, the heaviest of all tarmacs, cost much lower than the Kibera road.

Mr Kinoti said Kura had no formal agreement with the NYS for the construction of the road and did not do the costing of dry materials in the schedules it provided the NYS.

He said Kura did not abdicate its mandate and insisted the agency was 100 per cent responsible for the road.

“We have not given NYS any clearance certificates because the works are incomplete and equipment and materials are still on site. We hope they will resume work and in the event they fail, we will provide funds in the coming budget to complete the works,” he said.

Kura engineers, he said, were on the ground checking materials quality and construction works and to ensure that where the NYS failed they were asked to redo the works.