One of the promises of the Kenya Kwanza regime was to make open the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) contract.
Today, amidst the furore of the KQ airline pilot strike, Cabinet Secretary for Transport Kipchumba Murkomen has made the SGR contract public.
“As promised I have released the SGR agreements to the people of Kenya. I have given a copy to the Majority Leaders Kimani Ichungwa and Aaron Cheruiyot for them to table in the respective Houses of Parliament. I have also shared a copy with the media,” CS Murkomen posted on social media.
We cover what Kenyans feel about the move.
Lawyer Ahmednassir Abdullahi commended the CS for ‘keeping his word’.
“Thanks Waziri for keeping your word. Can we now have the beneficial owners of the Expressway way too?”, Abdullahi wrote on Twitter
Vincent Enock (@Vevenock) replied to Murkomen by posting a tweet by NTV dated Nove 27th 2021 in which the media station claimed that the “Auditor-General Report confirms KPA was listed as principal security in SGR deal with China”.
Wesley Kibandi (@this_is_Wessley) however read a sinister motive in the move.
Your mission seems like confusing the people of the Republic of Kenya with unearthing scandals that you were part of. SGR was built when UDA was part of the government and Raila Odinga complained of the over expenditures, now you want to fool Kenyans that you are delivering?,” he wrote
The contract
In 2020, Nation Media Group revealed that the costing for SGR was grossly exaggerated.
One example the media house gave was that of grass costing Sh1 billion. That document containing bill of quantities and other contracts was already leaked and has been covered extensively elsewhere.
Furthermore, the new contract that CS Murkomen has leaked appears to be just part of the agreement.
The first to leak didn’t capture anything to do with the Port of Mombasa being collateral to the loans. The new one shared today does.
Thank you Minister for acting on this. However, this is just the loan agreement, will you please find us all the master commercial agreement b/w the KRC and China Road & Bridge + the gov support agmt from national treasury. Lastly, there an O&M doc may we see that as well pls… – Vishal Agarwal wrote
Many Kenyans have mirrored the issues that Sri Lanka is facing, where the country has lost its port operations to China for failure to pay debt.
Hambantota port was signed over to Beijing on a 99-year lease because Sri Lanka cannot repay Chinese loans it took out to build the port in the first place.
The contract shared by Murkomen today
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Open in new tab In the document that leaked in 2020, inflating of costs was a major issue.
The 44-paged Section 13 Appendix A: Non-Binding Bill of Quantities area.
The prices of basic commodities were raised to levels unprecedented for example a mere bench cost Sh180,000. The prices were quoted in United States Dollars (USD) and the conversion rate for the below section will be USD 1 for Sh100.
A battery forklift that costs about Sh900,000 was bought at Sh1.37 million.
Acetylene cylinder normally worth Sh5,000 was purchased at Sh38,040.
A good lighting arrester retailing for between Sh500 and Sh3000 was sold to Kenya at the price of Sh11,680.
The Chinese company, China Road and Bridge Corporation (CRBC) signed the contract with the Kenya government, National Treasury.
Digital voice recorders cost as little as Sh2,000 in Nairobi. These small costs here and there multiplied by the number of gadgets being bought added up to billions of shillings.
CRBC also billed Kenyans Sh38 million to install a passenger guiding system, Sh14.6 million for each security system at the railway stations, Sh26 million for each luggage inspection system and Sh14 million for passenger monitoring systems at the stations.
The company also said it bought 46 A3 laser printers at Sh513,700 each for use at the stations during construction. The Nairobi station received five of these printers. These printers currently cost between Sh40,000 and Sh75,000.
We shall bring comprehensive analysis at a later date.
