The deplorable state of the Jua Kali sector in Bungoma County

Written by Daniel Saenyi

In a bid to better its services to the public, the Ministry of Labor is carrying out a survey to establish its shortcomings in the different districts and also see its accomplishments.

 The delegation led by the deputy permanent secretary in the Ministry of Labor Mr. Patrick Mwangi visited Bungoma County for the survey and the major let down seen in the ministry’s evaluation is the Jua Kali sector. The jua kali sector in Bungoma District has more or less stalled as they attributed this to lack of electricity and relevant infrastructure to see its growth.

 Land grabbing was also noted to be another reason for lack of growth of the sector as the District Commissioner Mr. Wilfred Nyagwanga pointed out that the District Hospital land and Airstrip land had been grabbed hindering the development of the airstrip business in the district.

Some of the delegates suggested that the Jua Kali artisans elect leaders regularly because the current leaders have had the posts for long and no development has been done in the sector. They urged them to vet the people they appoint so as to have a crop of leaders to catalyze development.

The town has a large population yet many youth grow up and live despondently due lack of a retirement plan. The NSSF Regional Manager Mrs. Rose Marienga pointed out that many youths get money, spend it in an extravagant fashion and end up suffering, so the NSSF is trying to transform itself to a pension scheme whereby the youth will get money in installments to avoid misuse as they save.

Even with this, very few individuals that have joined the security fund, their businesses are small i.e Bodaboda or fruit vendors, it was suggested that all small business owners will be encouraged to join unions to be able to serve them better as a group.

The labor ministry is not working effectively in the region because their movement is limited due to lack of transport vehicles and lack proper logistical frameworks.

On the visit to the local Jua Kali site, the shopping halls were desolate and abandoned, much to the surprise of the delegates, as they were expecting a noisy place, only a few jikos and half done bicycles lay on the verandah. Clearly they had been bought as the site seems to have never been functional for the past decade. 

Most Jua Kali artisans have opted to work on the streets as they easily access electricity and those working from the site had nothing but complaints to show for. They claim to have a big security problem as the sites chain link has been breached a thousand times, exposing them to a lot of theft of their products. 

According to Mr. Mwangi, work station management regulations have to be implemented within the small groups like Jua Kali to enable them function effectively. The management regulations are to facilitate leadership positions to be introduced in the sector and also be able to join unions as groups for their issues to be addressed. 

The different ministries in the county suffer a shortage of workers, a factor leading to the depreciating state of the small businesses in the County. Some ministries have about two officers in the county and they have to serve a big area of the county to the level on three districts for one officer. 

The labor ministry was urged to employ more officers to supplement the wide areas needed to be covered and each officer is supposed to be stationed in the county they serve as serving many counties leaves others incapacitated.