Politics

The Kenya Private Sector Alliance (KEPSA) today presented the Private Sector Economic Manifesto for Nairobi County to the Kenya Kwanza Alliance candidate for Governor, Hon. Johnson Sakaja.

The Manifesto seeks to make Nairobi a livable city and emphasizes eight thematic areas where the private sector wants to see a change in how the capital city is governed including e-government compliance and enforcement, healthcare, competitiveness, and jobs creation as well as culture and social inclusion.

 “To make Nairobi a liveable city, requires among other interventions, an integrated planning approach to the provision of public goods such as infrastructure and services based on economic competitiveness, environmentally sustainable growth, social and financial inclusion as well as resilience and safety,” Carole Kariuki, KEPSA CEO, speaking on Tuesday 21, June during a meeting with Hon. Johnson Sakaja the Nairobi Governor aspirant for the Kenya Kwanza Alliance.

According to Carole Kariuki, KEPSA Chief Executive Officer (CEO), priority interventions include a working and sustainable urban mobility and transport system, an integrated urban land use plan, water, wastewater, and solid waste management, including robust security and disaster risk management agenda for the city.

“The vision of the private sector economic manifesto is to make Nairobi a livable city, and which requires among other interventions, an integrated planning approach to the provision of public goods such as infrastructure and services based on economic competitiveness, environmentally sustainable growth, social and financial inclusion as well as resilience and safety,” she said.

In the meeting, – part of ongoing engagements between KEPSA and the Presidential and Gubernatorial candidates to incorporate private-sector economic agenda into their manifestos – KEPSA tasked the outgoing Nairobi Senator to make Nairobi a competitive, green, inclusive, resilient, and safe city to live in, work, and do business, if he is elected on August 9, 2022.

In making the city great for business, work, and leisure, KEPSA now wants the Nairobi County government to embrace technology and innovative solutions to usher in a world-class mobility and transport system with proper management of traffic and congestion in the city.

“It is quite sad that we don’t have a working public transport system while our neighboring cities like Dar es Sa·laam, Kigali, and Addis Ababa have built Bus Rapid Transit systems. We need to ensure a working BRT where all other matatus and buses feed into various locations to bring order into the city and make it attractive for investors and safe to do business in, walk and promote tourism within the city”, explained Kariuki.

For a water-scarce city, Kariuki urged the incoming county government to develop an integrated system to manage water supply and particularly have a plan to increase water sufficiency, harvesting, and recycling and adopt smart waste management systems for Nairobi saying that only 45 percent of the 2,400 tons of daily solid waste in the city was being recycled.

Speaking at the event, the outgoing Senator for Nairobi said his vision for Nairobi city was to create an orderly and dignified city, where everyone obeys the law and feels equal, regardless of their status in society.

 Hon. Johnson Sakaja the Nairobi Governor aspirant for the Kenya Kwanza Alliance during a meeting with KEPSA.

“There is need to structure Nairobi properly because we want a city that is business-friendly and we will use the Urban Areas and Cities Act to restructure affairs of the county to usher in order and accountability and use technology to avoid revenue leakages,” Said Sakaja.

Responding to the concerns of water scarcity, Sakaja said if elected, his mission would be to ensure that over 80 percent of City households that don’t have running water had it by December 2023. He also promised to deal with the issue of multiplicity of business licenses by rationalizing all of them into a single business permit that has QR code, integrates all county requirements, and reduces human interaction as much as possible using technology platforms.

“All services offered at City Hall should now be made possible online across the different departments. We will make sure there’s only one all-inclusive license a business would be required to have that meets all compliance requirements of the County”, he added.

In supporting private enterprise, Sakaja said his government would set up a Kes 50 million stimulus program to boost Micro and Small Businesses in the 85 county wards in Nairobi. “We will work with KEPSA to develop and manage this program through business mentorships in the wards because we need to de-risk and support SMEs for them to also thrive”, he said.

On security and Disaster Risk Management, the private sector called on the County Governor aspirant for Nairobi to establish and operationalize a County Disaster Operation Center, fully equipped with Early Warning Systems, hazard mapping, a disaster monitoring database, and Standard Operating Procedures detailing the full continuum of procedures for handling Level 1 and Level 2 disasters.

KEPSA, being the voice of the private sector and convener of the Mkenya Daima Initiative is seeking to work with all aspiring leaders to influence their leadership manifestos for a people-centered and economy-led transformation of the country.

The Private Sector Economic Manifesto has been developed by KEPSA through a stakeholder engagement process cutting across all sectors of the economy. It draws out key priorities for national development and business sectoral priorities, which can only be achieved through partnership and collaboration with the government and other stakeholders.

KEPSA’s vision is to be a world-class private sector apex body with a primary mission is to ensure year-on-year improvement in the overall business environment for Kenya by working together with the government and other stakeholders and being involved in the socio-economic development of the country.