The United Democratic Alliance (UDA) party has moved to explain why some areas have been left for decades without tarmac roads amid public discussions on the state of roads in Homa Bay County.

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UDA Director of Communication Nathaniel Mong'are said the reason why areas like Homa Bay continue to lag in road infrastructure is because of historical government policies that he says marginalised some regions for decades.

According to Mong'are, the uneven distribution of tarmac roads across the country was partly rooted in policy decisions made shortly after independence.

The ruling party revealed that the issue began in 1965 when the Cabinet, by that time, passed the Sessional Paper No. 10, which contributed to regional disparities in government investment.

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The policy, Mong'are said, distinguished regions into two categories: the productive and the less productive. It required that the productive regions get infrastructure first before the less productive regions could.

"There are regions in this country that were left behind because of a policy decision. In 1965, somebody sat in the Cabinet and passed a Sessional Paper number 10 to say that  there are regions that are productive, there should be government investment. Then there are regions that are less productive, there should be no government investment," Mong'are stated.

This, Mong'are said, is the reason why many areas, perceived to have been marginalised, have been left without proper road development compared to other areas.

"And that entrenched historical marginalisation. They never saw development until today, when the president came to power and said, " We have to correct these historical injustices. For the first time, you are seeing development that is being distributed equally," he added.

As per the ruling party, there were only about 22,000 kilometres of tarmac road in the country when President William Ruto took power in 2022. Of the 22,000 kilometres, half of it was concentrated only in one region, while the other half was distributed among other regions.

"You cannot call that inclusive development when one half of the total kilometres of tarmac is concentrated in one region,"  Mong'are added.

📰 Source: Kenyans.co.ke