Hon. Onesimus Kipchumba Murkomen was appointed Cabinet Secretary in the Ministry of Roads and Transport on 27 September 2022 by H.E. President
William Samoei Ruto, after a change of administration following the 2022 General Election victory for the United Democratic Movement (UDA).

Prior to his appointment to Cabinet, Murkomen served as Senator for Elgeyo Marakwet for a short stint, having been re-elected for a third consecutive term in
the 9 August 2022 elections on a UDA party ticket. H.E. President Ruto’s Executive Order No 1 of 2022 outlining the structure of his Government, published on 12

October 2022, placed two State Departments within the purview of Hon. Murkomen – that of Roads and Transport, bestowing upon him the responsibility of overseeing institutional, structural, infrastructural, legal, policy, and regulatory reforms in the two critical sectors.

By virtue of his position, Hon. Murkomen is also in charge of key state agencies domiciled under two State Departments. They are Kenya Ports Authority (KPA),
Kenya Railways Corporation (KRC), Kenya Civil Aviation Authority (KCAA), Kenya Airports Authority (KAA), Kenya National Highways Authority (KeNHA), Kenya Rural Roads Authority (KeRRA), Kenya Urban Roads Authority (KURA), Engineers Board of Kenya (EBK), and Kenya Roads Board (KRB).

Hon. Murkomen was first elected Senator for Elgeyo-Marakwet in 2013 on a United Republican Party (URP) ticket upon the actualization of the 2010 Constitution and the institution of a bicameral Parliament.

In 2015, he was elected Senate Deputy Majority Leader, a position he held until the end of the term of the first Senate.

He would successfully retain his seat in the 2017 election under the banner of the Jubilee Party, and later appointed, by the party, to serve as Senate Majority Leader. Murkomen is credited with sponsoring and the enactment of four bills during his tenure at the Senate – the Urban Areas and Cities Amendment Bill (2017), the County Allocation of Revenue Amendment (No. 4) Bill (2017), the Intergovernmental (Amendment) Bill, 2014 and the Food Security Bill (2017).

He served as the first chair of the Senate Standing Committee on Devolution & Intergovernmental Relations, a Committee that was instrumental in the implementation of devolution as enshrined in the 2010 Constitution.

He also served in the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Senate Committee on Energy, Senate House Business Committee, Senate Rules and Procedures Committee, the Justice and Legal Affairs Committee, Joint Parliamentary Committee on Electoral Reforms, the County Public Accounts Committee and as a member of the Senate Speaker’s Panel.

Before joining Senate, Murkomen served in Kenya Anti-Counterfeit Agency Board and the Task Force on Devolved Government which is heralded for the drafting of six pieces of legislation upon which devolution is anchored. Besides being an astute politician and an academic of great repute, Hon. Kipchumba Murkomen is an Advocate of the High Court of Kenya with a wealth of experience and knowledge.

Hon. Murkomen graduated from the University of Nairobi with a Degree in Law in 2004 and later from the Kenya School of Law with a Post Graduate degree in the same. He holds a Master of Laws from the American University Washington College of Law and from the University of Pretoria in South Africa.

He has worked as a lecturer at the University of Nairobi, Moi University, and Catholic University, and has consulted and researched widely on topical issues of global interest among them the Global Organization in Human Rights and Environmental Conservation.

Hon Murkomen has also participated in exchange programs on African Leadership, Public Administration, and Globalization held at the University of Dar es Salaam (Tanzania), Makerere University (Uganda), the University of Nairobi (Kenya) and the University of California Los Angeles (USA) respectively, and coordinated by, among others, the Uongozi East Africa Institute.