KCB VENTURE 1 final

COUNTY: ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
The vision
Wajir Town, established
by the British in 1912 as their
regional colonial office, is one
of the country’s most remote
places. It’s a semi arid outback
that has never shed off its
badhia (rural area, in Somali
language) tag.
Located almost 700
kilometers from Nairobi, it
would take you about three
days by bus, if you are lucky.
If not, you can spend a week,
sleeping in the open, while
mechanics try to bring the bus
back to life.
Wajir, a dusty and rugged
town, is so remote that when
the county government put
out the advertisements for the
tarmacking of the roads, out of
the dozens of companies that
applied, only one qualified.
One of the main reasons why
most of the contractors were
disqualified is that they did not
even have a clue how the town
looked like.
Ogle Construction Company,
a family owned company that
was first started in northern
Kenya before spreading to the
rest of the country, was the
only one which qualified.
Registered in 2005, Ogle
Construction was the pioneer
road construction firm in
the former North Eastern
Province. The company has
Abdi argues that
without the input
of KCB Bank, the
project could
probably have
stalled.
“Due to structural
hiccups within the
county, we were not
getting the required
funds flow in time.
KCB Bank came at
the right time to
ensure that we had
the finances to carry
out the project in the
required time,”
Ogle Construction
MD, Mr. Ahmedsiad
Abdi
440
Wajir has a total of 440
km gravelled roads,
out of 5,280 km road
network. The rest of the
roads are unclassified.
Up to this year, the county
had no tarmac road.
However, the county has
an international airport
in Wajir and 7 airstrips;
Habaswein, Khorof Harar,
Wagalla, Buna, Bute,
Tarbaj, and Diff.
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