Nyeri County lays plans for slum upgrading

An aerial view of Majengo slum in Nyeri County. [Courtesy]

Nyeri is among five counties that will benefit from the slum upgrading programme under the Kenya Informal Settlement Improvement Programme II (KISIP 2).

The project aims to improve access to basic services and security of tenure for residents in participating urban informal settlements and strengthen institutional capacity for slum upgrading in Nyeri and across the country.

Nyeri County Project Coordinating team chaired by Chief Officer Department of Lands Fredrick Maina held a meeting with the National (KISIP 2) team led by Gabriel Muli during the introduction of the consultant team.

"Institutional Capacity Development for Slum Upgrading undertakes activities designed to strengthen the capacity of counties and national government institutions by assisting national government institutions and counties in reviewing existing slum upgrading policies and strategies," Muli said.

He revealed that the consultant team will develop and carry out activities to train national and county teams mandated to implement policies and strategies and develop financing mechanisms for slum upgrading.

"The consultant team's primary role is to support the county-specific slum upgrading and prevention strategies. The consultant will engage stakeholders and collect views meant to improve the content, format, and implementation ability of the strategies," he said.

Muli said the team will also operationalise the county strategies by drafting relevant guidelines and overseeing sensitisation forums of stakeholders.

"The county slum upgrading and prevention strategy is a first step towards institutionalising informal settlements and slum upgrading and prevention within Nyeri county and expected to form part of the next CIDPs and lay the basis of funding slum upgrading programs," he said.

He said that the ten-month-long exercise will ensure that the proposed solutions are implemented.

Others who accompanied the Nyeri County KISIP team were Coordinator Director Physical Planning II Beatrice Koech, Municipal Manager Perister Kigwa, Project Surveyor Director Lands & Survey Daniel Mukiri, Project Physical Planner Joseph Njomo, Project Manager Engineer Eng Joseph Mwangi, Representatives from South Consulting Africa Ltd Prof Augustine Otieno and Elizabeth Wachomba among others.