1. POSSIBLE URBAN SPACES, BUNGOMA COUNTY
Bungoma County with a population of 1.63 million people is largely rural. Understandably,
even with a literacy rate of 61%, 53% of the county’s population is living below the poverty line.
The county is not urbanized enough to ensure almost all her residents have adequate income
opportunities. According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) only five counties
are more than 50% urban, namely, Nairobi, Mombasa, Kisumu, Kiambu and Machakos.
Bungoma County’s level of urbanization stands at 22% against the national average of 32%. The
only noticeable urban center in Bungoma County is Bungoma town (in Kanduyi constituency).
The rest are small emergent towns (i.e. Webuye); market centers (i.e. Chwele and Kimilili) and
minor tradition stations. Paved roads (bitumen surface) represent a negligible 6% of the road
network in the county with the remaining 94% being either gravel surface or earth surface.
Electricity access is less than 5%.
Bungoma County’s economy is mainly agricultural. The few industries in the county have
collapsed (i.e. Webuye Pan Paper Mills and Kitinda Dairies), on the verge of collapse (i.e. Nzoia
Sugar Company) or are negligible (i.e. BAT Malakisi and Mastermind).
Given the minimal level of urbanization, the income opportunities in the county are not enough
for residents and non-residents to utilize their adaptive capacities. As such, most of those who
drop-out of school and those who graduate from high school, colleges and universities either
move to major towns and cities, thereby not fully benefiting the county, or idle around adding
negligible value to society.
As part of efforts to achieve zero unemployment in Kenya, Tajiriba Foundation is pioneering a
minimum of 517 Tajiriba Spaces in Kenya; a minimum of 11 Tajiriba Spaces in every county.
Tajiriba Spaces are urban infrastructural platforms in rural areas and urban slums. Each Tajiriba
Space will cost a minimum of Kshs. 1 billion and will facilitate the creation of at least 4,000
income opportunities. Through this initiative, it is desired that it will be possible to facilitate the
creation of 10 million income opportunities inside a period of ten (10) years. Most of the income
opportunities (99%) will be created by the private sector while the public and non-profit sectors
will contribute the outstanding 1%.
Tajiriba Spaces can take three forms: Model Neighborhoods, Iconic Neighborhoods and/or My
Neighborhood.
Tajiriba Spaces are opportune for rural environments since they also address the challenge of
relatedness – politics along fault lines of identities. Politicians often mobilize, demarcate and
encourage discrimination along families, lineages, clans, ethnic groups, races, religions and
civilizations instead of pursuing policy alternatives thereby making impotent the integrative
and transformative functions of political parties. Tajiriba Spaces center connectedness through
popular people engagement at the neighborhood level. Tajiriba Spaces will be deliberately
aligned with the respective electoral zones to encourage issue-based party politics.

2. Tajiriba Spaces will be initiated in all the 47 counties. For the case of Bungoma County, Tajiriba
Spaces will conform to the nine (9) constituencies namely Mt Elgon, Bumula, Kanduyi, Webuye
West, Webuye East, Tongaren, Sirisia, Kimilili and Kabuchai. In the scheme of things, the site
currently hosting Webuye Pan Paper Mills will be transformed into a Tajiriba Space to create
more than 10,000 income opportunities.
Through popular people engagement, rural locations will be gradually transformed into urban
spaces (Tajiriba Spaces) under mixed development arrangement. Tajiriba Spaces will be
characterized by residential facilities; commercial centers encompassing retail outlets, shopping
malls, banking halls, petrol stations, meeting rooms and conference facilities, etc.; arenas for
political meetings and entertainment; and office space.
Urban centers are preferred the world over since they regularly surmount divisive structuring
of human and societal relations, increase human contact, boost trade and facilitate exchange of
new ideas and knowledge. Tajiriba Spaces are deliberately designed to be highly ambitious and
lofty to challenge the incumbent politicians and those wishing to replace them to think beyond
relatedness when aspiring for leadership.

3. The bulk of the funds to put up the urban infrastructure will be mobilized and sourced by
Tajiriba Foundation. This is on the understanding that the nonprofit sector has to step in for the
world to effectively address sub-par outcomes.
This write-up is a part of a series of postings to activate popular people engagement on how we
are plotting to implement Tajiriba Spaces in Bungoma County. It is meant to stimulate debate
among residents, incumbent leadership, contestants, county officials, the national government
and other stakeholders on the exact venues to situate urban spaces in Bungoma County.
Separate postings on other counties can be found on our Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/tajiriba and/or our website www.tajiriba.co.ke.
Tajiriba Spaces is a project of the Tajiriba Foundation, a not-for-profit organization. To
understand the justification for Tajiriba Spaces read the following published books at
https://www.amazon.com/author/geoffreysonkhamala:
i. Tajiriba Spaces: The Solution to Sub-Optimal Outcomes (2015)
ii. Zero Unemployment in Kenya: The Utility of Tajiriba Spaces (2015)
***Geoffreyson Khamala is still a toddler on social media with less than a thousand friends with
most of them coming from outside Bungoma County. Share the post to reach a wider audience!
Phone: +254 710 189 154
© Geoffreyson Khamala (2015)