President William Ruto has announced that he will transform Kibra slums before the end of his tenure.
The Head of State was reacting to sentiments from a plumber who is working in the Affordable Housing project based in Kibra, Nairobi County.
Stanley, as he identified himself, stated that living in slums is challenging for most families as there is barely any privacy in those single-roomed shelters.
President Ruto in his response, sympathized with Stanley, as he reiterated that the Affordable Housing plan was founded to address such challenges.
“I don’t know how to feel when Stanley says children in those neighborhoods cannot be taught about sex at 10 because it is something they witness everyday because of how those settlements are.
“This Housing plan is about creating dignity amongst all of us. What we are doing in Kibra is transformation. We are doing 4,054 units in the 1st phase. We have 22 acres for the next phase,” he added.
The first in command also responded to Stanley’s special request to rename Kibra slums into an estate.
“Those of us reporting on Affordable Housing plan in kibra, please spare them the phrase ‘vitongoji duni’. I think we are going to change the name and hopefully we will call it Baraka Estate or something like that,” Ruto added.
He restated his campaign promise to eradicate the slum dwelling and offer decent houses to the vast population residing in Kibra.
“My commitment in the next 10 years is that we will not have a slum in Kibra we will have an estate. As we create the housing units we will be moving people from the slums to those units to make sure that we increase social housing especially in those areas.”
Ruto then inquired from Stanley on what he would advise government to improve in order to attain their goal.
Stanley bluntly told the President to curb all corruption loopholes in the Affrodable Housing plan to avoid stalling like with certain National Youth Service (NYS) projects.
“I want to assure all Kenyans contributing to the housing levy, I will do whatever it takes to protect these resources. I want to give a warning to anybody working in this project, if you step off line, it will not be business as usual.”
