Murkomen issues fresh deadline for completion of Karatu Stadium

Sports Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen now says the construction of Karatu Stadium in Kiambu County will be completed by the end of next month, after almost seven years of delay.

In an inspection tour on Friday, the CS said the contractor had signed a return-to-work agreement with the ministry and undertook to complete the remaining works within four weeks if the government would commit to allocate the remaining funds.

“We would have loved to have a bigger land, but this is the best we would get in this part of our country. And we're very happy for the community having surrendered this facility for the purpose of construction of this community stadium.”

The 2000-seater facility located in Gatundu South was commissioned in 2017 and it has so far gobbled up over Ksh 260 million.

The CS said the contractor was in the final stages of roofing the podium and adding finishing touches to additional facilities.

“This stadium is 2000 seater and it has a very well done running track. What's remaining now is to add the tartan on top of it, we have done the concrete, the football pitch, which can also be customized to play rugby. We also have a possibility of doing a few field events, including javelin and triple jump. We also have room to put maybe netball, basketball and volleyball. So the space has been really maximized,” he added.

While appearing before the National Assembly on Wednesday this week, the CS said situations in most of the stalled facilities remain an eyesore but the ministry was in the process of clearing all pending bills before resumption of works.

"I've given my team two weeks to review and start paying any pending bills then we can complete the pending stadiums. We don't want another round of lamentations on why we've stalled projects."

Gatundu South Member of Parliament G.G. Kagombe said once completed the stadium would be a great resource for developing local talent as well as hosting regional and international sporting events.

The legislator also said surrounding learning institutions will benefit from the facility as students will use it for training.