Safari ya Bamba Si Machero.......

Safari ya Bamba ni machero (The journey to Bamba is tomorrow) is an old Giriama childhood song that is sang by children when they gather in the evening as they wait for their mothers to cook.

Though innocently sang, it’s a song that tells you that if you want to travel to Bamba, you must be adequately prepared both psychologically and physically because going there is not a journey for the faint. It requires both stamina and determination.   

As a young reporter working in the District Information Office Mariakani  in the late 90s, the assignment I dreaded most was to be sent for coverage in Bamba, some thirty kilometers north of Mariakani in Kilifi County. Going to Bamba meant that you would have to leave early and come back late. You would swallow all the dust on the road and brace yourself for the scorching sun and thirst. There was no assurance that you would come back the same day and if you would it would not be later than midnight. It would be worse if it rained.

Bamba back then had no piped water and if you dared drink the available Mtsara (Dam) water you would be welcoming sicknes into your body. I remember one day when we went to cover a ministerial function and I was so thirsty that I drank the water, what followed was a stomach infection that were it not for a specialist in Mombasa, it would have been another story.

The story of the neglect of Bamba and other dry areas in Kilifi is a long and old one. Since 2002 general elections, leaders have been elected based on their promise to develop the area and dumped based on their inability to fulfill those promises.

Workers on  a section of the road linking Mariakani and Bamba in Kilifi County.

However, there seems to be some light at the end of the tunnel. I was delighted to note that the people of Bamba will no longer have to wait for “tomorrow” so that they can travel. The Deputy President WilliamRuto was in Bamba to inspect the progress of the 51 kilometre road linking  Mariakani, Bamba and Kilifi that will cost the taxpayer Kshs 2.1 billion.

See what he said https://twitter.com/WilliamsRuto/status/834348826928504834

I became happy for the people of these areas because I have been witness to what they go through as they travel to their homes. I was happy not for everything else but that the people can go to the nearest towns and market their produce.

As a citizen, I told myself that, I would not care for anything else but to know that there is a government cares and puts in place infrastructure that makes my life easier in terms of provision of basic infrastructure.