Kitui district: just how big is the Kitui district?

Well, the original Kitui district (on which the current Kitui county is based) was a very vast district. It is said to be over 32,000 square kilometers, making it larger than some of these nations you hear about.

For you to understand just how big Kitui district/Kitui county is, you need to travel from one end of it to another. In between, you are likely to cover 150 to 200 kilometers to move from one end of Kitui district/Kitui county to the other. I mean, just think about – moving from one end of Kitui in Mutha to another end in, say, Ukasi. Between Mutha and Ukasi, you are looking at anything from 200 to 250 kilometers, and all that is within the same county. Or take another example, of the distance between Athi (on the Kibwezi Mutomo highway where Kitui district starts) and Endau on the other end of Kitui. In between, you are looking at more than 150 kilometers.

Many people have argued that Kitui district actually ought to have been divided into two: giving rise to Kitui district and Mwingi district (which then at 2010 would have given rise to Kitui county and Mwingi County). The only problem is in the fact that Kitui district previously used to be viewed as a sparsely populated district. Thus, whereas the folks at the top would have seen sense in dividing it on the basis of its geographical area, they used to argue that the population residing in it wouldn’t justify it. But that argument can’t hold water today, given the fact that Mwingi region has grown population-wise to a level where it now has is it 4 or 5 constituencies – Mwingi East, Mwingi West, Mwingi Central, Mwingi North and so on. That is on top of Kitui regions own constituencies like Kitui East, Kitui West, Kitui South, Kitui Rural, Kitui Central and so on. So you see for sure that Mwingi is like a different region within the same county – hence the calls for creation of Mwingi county.

All said and done, the former Kitui district was very vast, and it is hard to understand how the Kitui DC, sitting at Kitui town, was able to administer such a vast region, especially at a time when communication infrastructure was not very well developed.