BY OLIVER MATHENGE
THE Presidency has restored the Irrigation docket to the Water and Irrigation ministry that it had taken from newly appointed Secretary Eugene.
Wamalwa starts work at his Maji House office this morning.
The Star has learnt that President Uhuru Kenyatta last week gave his Chief of Staff Joseph Kinyua instructions to withdraw an earlier letter dated June 30.
The earlier letter, obtained by the Star, had no functions related to irrigation – which has a Sh15 billion budget – assigned to Wamalwa.
Kinyua had listed water resource management policy, water and sewerage services management policy, waste water and treatment and disposal policy as some of the functions under Wamalwa.
Other functions include water catchment area conservation, control and protection, restoration of strategic water towers and the restoration of the Lake Naivasha Basin.
Water quality and pollution control, sanitation management, dam construction schemes management, flood control and land reclamation and management of public water schemes and community water projects are also Wamalwa functions.
Acting Agriculture CS Adan Mohammed was instructed to hand over to Wamalwa yesterday, after failing to show up last week.
Wamalwa, who was sworn in last week, was nominated the CS for Water and Irrigation, but the earlier letter from State House shows that his functions only deal with water.
His swearing-in was delayed for a month as Deputy President William Ruto's URP wing protested the hiving off of Irrigation from the Ministry of Agriculture.
During the vetting by MPs, Wamalwa said that he would work to ensure that the multi-billion-shilling Galana Irrigation Project did not stall.
The Ministry of Agriculture is under Felix Koskei, who is currently on suspension and who hails from Ruto's Rift Valley backyard.
Irrigation has been a role of the Agriculture Ministry. Water was hived off from the Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources, whose CS is Judi Wakhungu.
Last week, Mohammed failed to show up for the handover ceremony at Maji House with only Wakhungu in attendance. As a result, the ceremony, which was to take place on the same day he was sworn in, was abruptly called off.
At the time, Wamalwa however downplayed the issue, saying that the handing over would take place this week.
During the swearing-in at State House last week, the URP wing of the Jubilee Coalition was not represented.
The former Saboti MP was nominated by President Kenyatta in April, but it was not until June 10 that Parliament approved his nomination.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/wamalwa-gets-irrigation-docket-after-political-power-struggle#sthash.Kpwbs6RS.dpuf
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