President Ruto: Thwake Multipurpose Dam is a bankable project and a catalyst for sustainable development

By Godffrey Olali and PCS
President William Ruto has indicated his optimism and confidence that Thwake Multipurpose Water Development Program (TMWDP) is a bankable project poised to uplift many lives in the lower region of the country. 
While speaking in Wote town, Makueni County, early this year, the Head of State said after completion, the dam will provide water for domestic use, livestock and irrigation for the purpose of increasing food production in the region.
“We are going to increase the size of the dam. The dam is expected to be complete by mid this year. I will come to commission it before the end of the year,” said Dr. Ruto.
He said the money has been made available for the expansion of the dam to meet the needs of residents in the region.
Dr. Ruto has been on record stating the Government has prioritised the construction and expansion of dams to rebuild agriculture.
“If we produce more food, it means more earnings for our farmers and more jobs for our youth. Irrigation is the most transformational intervention we can undertake in agriculture,” the Head of State has said in the past.
He noted that dams hold immense power to stimulate food production as it cuts over-reliance on rain-fed agriculture. 
The Government plans to build 100 large and 1,000 small dams, thereby increasing the acreage under irrigation from the current 670,000 to 3 million.
The Government is keen to initiate Public Private Partnerships to deliver 100 dams and in a bid to progressively increase land under irrigation to 3 million acres.
The Head of State has also stated that in three years, the government plans to expand the land under irrigation to 1.4 million acres citing irrigation as the surest intervention to countering food shortage.
"Irrigation is the ultimate solution in guaranteeing food security in our country. We are working on innovative investment mechanisms through private - public partnerships to construct at least 100 dams," he stated.

The Government of Kenya and the African Development Bank (ADB) through the Ministry of Water, Sanitation and Irrigation is implementing Thwake Multipurpose Water Development Program Phase 1. This is a flagship program under Vision 2030 of the Government of Kenya (GOK) whose overall objective is to fulfill the long-term country’s development ambition in the areas of water, energy and agriculture, and a key project under the Government Bottom Up Economic Transformation Agenda (BETA). 
It will also provide regulation of flows on River Athi downstream of the dam for flood control and drought mitigation.

The program under which the project is being implemented has four phases namely, construction of an 80.5 m high multi-purpose dam with storage capacity of 688 million cubic meter and associated preliminary works located one kilometer downstream of the confluence of Thwake and Athi Rivers. A concrete-faced  embankment dam covering an area of  9,217 acres, with a catchment spanning about 10,276 km2, development of water supply, sanitation and waste water infrastructure to supply estimated 150,000 m3/day of treated water to approximately 1.3 million people drawn from the rural areas of Kitui and Makueni Counties and Konza Techno City in Machakos County and the development of hydropower generating system with an installed capacity of approximately 20 MW. 
Fourth phase will see development of an Irrigation Scheme to ultimately  irrigate 40,000 hectares (approx. 100,000 acres) of land.
The Ministry is currently implementing phase 1 of the Program.  The Construction Contract was contracted in November 2017 with a scope of constructing an 80.5meter Concrete Face Rockfill Dam (CFRD) at the confluence of Athi and Thwake rivers in Makueni and Kitui counties with a storage capacity of 688 million m3. The contract sum was Ksh 36,971,346,445. Procurement process was guided by the Africa Development Bank’s procurement rules and guidelines for works and services.