Nakuru Governor Kinuthia Mbugua on Friday urged the High Court to punish two MPs

Nakuru Governor Kinuthia Mbugua
on Friday urged the High Court to
punish two MPs for funding
hawkers to reconstruct sheds
demolished by county askaris.
Mr Mbugua said Nakuru Town
East MP David Gikaria and his
Nakuru Town West counterpart
Samuel Arama blatantly
disregarded court orders last
weekend and led hawkers in
reconstructing the sheds on road
reserves.
According to Mr Mbugua, the
orders issued by Justice Hellen
Omondi had directed the county
government and Mr Gikaria to
maintain the status quo whereby
no more demolition should take
place and no shed should be
rebuilt.
Through lawyer Tom Ojienda, the
governor said the two MPs had
vowed to continue providing funds
for reconstructing, saying it was
against his pledge to Nakuru
residents to make the town as
"clean as it was in the seventies."
TOWN'S IMAGE 'TARNISHED'
Mr Mbugua said the order denied
him a chance to "clean" all towns
of unplanned "ugly" structures he
blamed for insecurity.
“The legislator has been assisting
vendors to rebuild the demolished
structures,” Mr Ojienda told court.
Mr Gikaria obtained an injunction
stopping the demolitions, saying
poor hawkers had no other source
of income.
The court directed that the two
MPs attend court on November 12,
when the application seeking to
stop the demolitions will be heard.
But Mr Mbugua said all stalls
within the Central Business District
would be demolished on the
grounds that they were tarnishing
the town’s image and that they
hampered his government’s bid to
make Nakuru secure and investor-
friendly.
SELF-HELP GROUPS
The demolitions first started in the
industrial area section of the town,
targeting hundreds of makeshift
food kiosks constructed next to the
busy Nakuru-Eldoret highway.
He urged traders to form self-help
groups, which they would use to
engage the planning department in
seeking solutions to the challenges
related to hawking.
The governor said the county
government would only allow
"beautifully made" stalls to be
constructed on selected road
reserves, saying haphazard
constructions had made the town,
once voted as the cleanest in
Africa, ugly and filthy.
In the past few months, stalls have
also been demolished around
Nakuru’s Afraha Stadium, Shabab
area, Langa Langa, Free Area,
Kiundu and Barnabas in the
outskirts of the town.