Transport nominee Kipchumba Murkomen to make SGR contract public – Business Daily
Senator Kipchumba Murkomen before the vetting committee on October 19, 2022. PHOTO | DENNIS ONSONGO | NMG
Roads, Transport and Public Works Cabinet Secretary nominee Kipchumba Murkomen will publicise the standard gauge railway (SGR) contract that has been kept secret by the State, Parliament heard Wednesday.
Mr Murkomen said no one knows the details of the multibillion-shilling project, yet it should be a public document.
Attempts to make the agreements entered between Kenya and Chinese contractors over the construction of Sh450 billion SGR through the courts have not borne fruit, with the government maintaining that they had non-disclosure clauses.
The government has also argued in court that the move would endanger national security and injure foreign relations between the states that the country has entered into bilateral agreements with and would stifle the successful implementation of the National Transport Policy.
Mr Murkomen told the MPs that he had spoken to the who is who, and none of them confessed to having seen the SGR contract.
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“If approved, my first business will be to look for the SGR contract and make it public to Kenyans with the help of the National Assembly,” he said.
Kenya is obligated to honour repayment of the Sh327 billion it borrowed for the project from the Exim Bank of China in May 2014 and started repaying last year after the expiry of the five-year grace period.
