According to the seasoned politician, the Ministry needs an astute leader, not necessarily an Information Technology expert.
He said that his tenures as Kiambu Governor in 2013 and twice as Juja Member of Parliament (MP) granted him top leadership qualities, winning President William Ruto’s trust to add him to his Cabinet.
“To run a hospital, you don’t need to be a surgeon. In this field there is no expert. If you keep up with the times, you should keep up with ICT things,” he told Capital FM on Wednesday.
“What brought me here was leadership. It was my experience that brought me to government.”
The ICT CS added that his leadership approach at the Ministry has however been met with deeply-rooted challenges that he has vowed to weed out.
“I went into the ministry and I saw laxity. People were demoralized. Some things will not work. (For example) An agency cannot tell me how many employees they have. Records are such that they have payrolls from every place. I directed that we need biometrics in that agency. They did that yesterday, 6 weeks later,” he noted.
“This energy I bring is to keep things moving. It has improved things. I find myself going to offices to understand what is happening. I am causing things to happen and I am firm that we must do the right thing.”
Kabogo asserted that he will ensure to be the first CS to create a digitized government, noting that his Ministry went paperless as of April 7, 2025.
“We have a very serious ministry. I want to be the one who made the government digital. That is difficult because there has been a lot of resistance based on how things in government have been done,” he said.
As part of the reforms he plans to instill, he intimated that the Ministry is planning to build a public portal that will allow Kenyans to hold online conversations and call leaders to action.
“We want ministers to have two hours talking to Kenyans,” noted Kabogo.
He said that it is through allowing Kenyans to air their discontent that the government will know how to better serve its citizens.
“We should allow Kenyans to express. You saw how they attacked me with memes. I really didn’t know them and that is what we expect as a country,” he added, reflecting on a recent online ridicule over his presumed incompatibility.
During the online clamor, Kabogo was mocked by people suggesting that he is helplessly unversed with matters to do with computer proficiency, advanced knowledge of programming and emerging technologies like AI.
