President has too much on his plate to tour counties just yet, says Esipisu

President Uhuru Kenyatta's plan to work from the counties for eight months has not stalled; he is just trying to balance his responsibilities, his spokesman said yesterday.

At the beginning of the year, the presidency announced that Uhuru would spend more time in the counties to launch projects and interact with wananchi. He was to work from the various State Houses and State Lodges in Samburu, Sagana, Kakamega, Nakuru, Eldoret, Kisumu and Mombasa.

However, Uhuru has only made a few visits, with a number of others being put off, despite lobbying by local leaders. Some of the long overdue projects he was to launch are integral to the Jubilee 2013 manifesto. Uhuru was to use the opportunity to interact with opinion leaders from all regions at the grassroots level.

juggling responsibilities

"The tours have not stalled. The President has various priorities and has to balance them diligently and prudently. You have seen him meeting various delegations from various regions to discuss development work, including commissioning of projects," State House spokesman Manoah Esipisu said.

He failed to give, however, an indication of whether the President was scheduled to make any trips to the counties in the foreseeable future.

On Tuesday, the President was supposed to be in Kisii and Nyamira counties followed by a tour to Western next week. In the last week of August, the President was scheduled to visit the Coast. He was to visit Kwale, Kilifi, Mombasa and Lamu counties.

The Star has established, however, that the President has been reluctant to make the visits because he wants to launch complete projects. The President has been commissioning the start of projects but he is said to be reluctant to launch incomplete ones in the last year of his term as this will not bode well for his re-election.

Esipisu said, "He will visit the counties in due course. We have had UNCTAD and now we have Ticad coming up, plus some foreign visits or receiving of foreign heads, so clearly the President is paying attention to all his obligations. Plans remain in place and will be communicated in due course."

Uhuru has in the past two weeks received delegations from Western, South Nyanza and the Maasai regions to discuss his planned visits to the counties.

Source