Mike Sonko: Why Nairobi was different during my tenure

For about one year now, there have been murmurs about the development and leadership style of Nairobi County under the current administration.

Before the current regime under the leadership of Governor Sakaja, some County functions were under the national government which had tasked the defunct Nairobi Metropolitan Service for service delivery.

For about three years NMS, under supervision of Lt. General Mohamed Badi with his army men delivered some amazing things, among them Uhuru Park, hospitals and fixed some dilapidated roads in the city.

The functions managed by NMS including transport; public works, utilities and ancillary services were taken away from former Nairobi governor Mike Sonko who was later impeached.

About two years since the current regime took office there has been a lot of political buzz which has elicited mixed reactions.

And now, the former governor Sonko in an interview with YouTuber Andrew Kibe has shared how he managed to run the capital city before the tides changed.

Among the sticky issues that have dogged the current regime include managing flood waters and graft among other issues that Sonko candidly spoke about.

“When we used to expect rains, before that, we could engage everyone to unclog the drainages, initially I had gone to Rwanda to benchmark,” he said.

It was from Rwanda that he says he borrowed the leaf stating that during his regime city residents were fully involved in cleaning drainages ahead of the log rains.

“The entry and exit points of the city determine the cleanliness of the city, that is why I planted flowers from the airport all the way to Kangemi before the expressway,”.

On current floods in the city, the former governor described it as a kin national disaster citing that back then there were no deaths as being witnessed at the moment.

“The floods are all over and I cannot blame the governor but I cannot defend him as such. I correct him when things go wrong,” he stated.

Pointing out, “During my time people used to criticise which is a common thing in politics, even another governor who will come in will be criticized,”

He added that his impromptu visits to hospitals at night helped him fix the dilapidated states of some county hospitals.

In the lengthy conversation, the former County boss claimed that at one time some staff in revenue collection took him a Sh50 million bribe from the daily collections.

This he claimed shocked him and enlightened him on how the city was making millions in revenue collections in a day.

“I realized that the county was making a lot of money but much was getting lost to corruption so I went to report it in State House,”

“I only didn’t know I was going to dig my own grave. I had given them the clearest hint that Nairobi had money, and later Statehouse could come after me,”

Amid the recorded conversation, Sonko claimed the county could make up to Sh300 million daily collections but only about Sh50 million would end up in the accounts with the rest getting looted. 

After taking the evidence to the State House, he said a plot was hatched to set a trap to arrest the people behind the looting and he got reinforced by an intelligence unit to get the perpetrators in action.

He said a trap was then laid to arrest the city hall officers behind the scheme and eventually they were caught in action by EACC and DCI officers.

“I was trying to help fight corruption but how things turned around and my status tainted as the most corrupt leading to my impeachment I still don’t understand.” He said.