We Inherited Impassable Roads, Broken Bridges, and Poor Health Facilities, Demotivated Work Force Among Others

As we mark one year of devolution, which means decentralizing power from the centre to the 47 counties created by the Constitution of Kenya, 2010, I can only foresee a bright future for the people of Narok County.

Indeed, I wish to emphasize that the government has shown a high level of commitment to the wellbeing of our generation by bringing services closer to the people.

Unlike in the past, where most decisions affecting the masses at the grassroots were made at the top, the devolved system of government has reversed the trend. This is a great leap forward towards the launching pad of social, economic and industrial development.

The people now have a greater opportunity to participate in matters of local public governance. Access to political and economic administration has given priority to their needs in an inclusive and inductive manner as opposed to the initial top-to-bottom approach that saw successive regimes decide which projects to carry out for various regions, oblivious of the people’s needs. In real sense, devolution will advance democracy, which is essentially the rule of the people by the people. When the people are given powers to decide what they want the State or the county government to do for them, based on the stakeholders assessment, then they will rule themselves.

The county administration will only enforce the laws. A reflections of the journey that we have taken over the past year that we have been in office reveals successes and shortcomings, as we continue to address the challenges. We inherited impassable roads, broken bridges, and poor health facilities, demotivated work force among others. All these have now been turned around through the commissioning of various road rehabilitation projects across the county, procurement of drugs that have been distributed to all the health centers, vaccination of livestock against diseases across the county, among other development activities.

Despite the setbacks devolution has experienced in the last one year, the milestones gained so far surpass the challenges. The first stage of our journey was about setting up the requisite structures to enable devolution work, which is having all the key institutions and departments, as provided under the legislation that governs the management and administration of county governments in the Constitution. Such departments include the crucial County Public Service Board that takes charge of county staff recruitment and management by ensuring that the two-thirds gender rule is applied to cater for women, youth and marginalized groups to ensure gender equity in the county administration.

Governor Samuel ole Tunai, Deputy Governor Evalyn
Aruasa sign contracts on time limits for road projects.

This is a clear demonstration of the county executive and administration’s respect and commitment to the rule of law. As a county, we need to recruit and retain the best and competent human resource that will manage county resources and roll forward the established development programmes.

Conversely, as the drivers of this process, the Narok County Government is committed to ensuring that devolution succeeds for the county to bolster the country’s targeted socioeconomic and political development targets this year and attain a middle-income economy status envisaged in the Vision 2030.