As far as breakeven/loss making of SGR is concerned, i will cite two famous/major railways in the world.You have probably used their services and can give a testament hapa.

1. The Eurostar

2. The Shinkansen

These two suffered crippling losses and debt in their early days but are now major economic movers.Thus,It is still early days for us to determine whether SGR is a white or a black elephant.

The argument that Kenya could have instead upgraded the century old mubeberu railway line for 40 billion and channel the remaining funds to upgrade other roads is a sad joke. This argument is equivalent to saying lets repaint the existing public primary schools in Nairobi instead of building new ones to cater for growing population because there is no value for money in building new ones.

Unfortunately for David "nay" Ndii et al, SGR was built complete with a brand new NAirobi ICD and the Roads were upgraded/built/are being built etc as well.

This might be painful to watu wa goggles(Ndii and others), but ukweli ni kwamba, H.E. Uhuru na serikali yake ya awamu ya Nne has done well as far as infrastructure (roads, rails, dams and ports) are concerned. I can give many examples of many roads that have been upgraded line in line with the SGR and other major projects such as upgrading Mombasa port and building "brand new" Lamu port.

Well, i don't deny that money has been eaten and continue to be eaten by government officials and politicians and others. Hapo si bishani. I actually condemn corruption with the strongest terms possible.

However, what iam against is fighting all the progressive moves by past,current and future governments just for the sake of it.

The $6bn SGR could have built:

$0.4bn EMGR (Enhanced MGR). Add improvements to other sections, etc for another $100mn

A $3bn [which is inflated but I will use it] Nairobi-Mombasa multiple lane highway that REALLY connects all the towns along the route similar to Expressways in the USA. If not inflated, then Nairobi to Kisumu connecting many more towns!

And we have $2.5bn left over for other projects including a proper tram or intra-city train system for Nairobi and Mombasa. Add Kisumu and Nakuru to that list.

With Lamu, does Kenya really need a new SGR from Mombasa to Naivasha?
Couldn't a SGR from Lamu suffice to move goods to UG?

And the enhancement of the MGR could have used/included LOCAL expertise, labor and materials instead of importing virtually everything from China. What's worse is that the SGR is being run by the Chinese whose interest in sharing the knowledge with us is minimal.

@Fyatu

#TanoTena has effed us. Properly. Twice on Sunday.

Arror-Kimwarer
Gulalu
SGR
KQ

Even the PPPs worry me given the "traffic guarantees" that have been hinted at.
I can't even figure out whether the 180bn toll road will pay off. I hope it does.
The economics of the Westlands-JKIA expressway seems more dubious to me.

Unfortunately, we will have to pay off the loans or guarantees long after the kickbacks have been eaten.

She should be advised to stop looking for jobs and become an entrepreneur.

https://kenyanwallstreet...10-by-end-of-september/

Kenya’s total revenue by the end of September 2020 declined to KSh 378.7 Billion from KSh421.2 Billion collected in the same period last year according to a Treasury report. The revenue collection in the first three months of the fiscal year 2020/2021 fell below government’s target of KSh 428.9 billion.

Treasury attributed the weak revenue collection to underperformance in Value Added Tax, Pay As You Earn, Excise Duty, and Import Duty.
Pay As You Earn in the three months to September 2020 dropped by 27% (yoy) to KSh 71.6 billion largely due to the 5% individual tax rate reduction introduced in March, as well as the many job cuts and pay cuts carried out in most Kenyan companies.
Value-Added Taxes (VAT) on Domestic and Imported goods declined by 30.8% and 9.5% respectively in the period under review.

In contrast, revenue from external grants rose sharply to KSh 3.9 billion, a 39.7% increase from KSh2.8 billion received in the same period last year.

Government spending in the three months period amounted to KSh 510.4 billion, of which KSh357.1 went to recurrent expenses such as debt repayment, wages, and pensions while KSh 122 billion went to development expenses.

Kenya’s budget deficit in the three months that ended in September grew to KSh 131.7 billion compared with KSh 123.5 billion during the same period in 2019, a 6.7% (yoy) increase.