Project Monitoring and Evaluation Practices and Performance of Public-Private Partnership Road Infrastructure Projects under Operation and Maintenance in Kenya

Project monitoring and evaluation (M&E) practices involve the systematic tracking of project inputs, activities and outputs against pre-set indicators to enable evidence-based corrective action. They are central to public-private partnership (PPP) road infrastructure projects, whose performance must be sustained over a long concession period and not only at the completion of construction. In Kenya, the performance of PPP road infrastructure projects under operation and maintenance remains a concern because of cost overruns, maintenance backlogs and fragmented data gathering, yet most local studies link M&E to project outcomes at the construction stage. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine the effect of project monitoring and evaluation practices on the performance of PPP road infrastructure projects under operation and maintenance in Kenya. It explored four practices, namely planning, technical expertise, stakeholder involvement and data management. The study was anchored on Results-Based Management Theory, Agency Theory, Stakeholder Theory and Systems Theory. The study adopted a quantitative descriptive survey design and targeted the four PPP road infrastructure projects under operation and maintenance in Kenya. A census was undertaken of 80 respondents comprising project managers, M&E officers, contract implementation officers, planning officers and technical staff, of whom 76 returned completed questionnaires. Structured questionnaires were used to collect data. Both descriptive and inferential statistical methods were used to analyse the data, which were presented in tables and discussed. The findings revealed that the four practices jointly explained 55.7% of the variation in project performance. Data management and planning were positive and statistically significant predictors of project performance, while technical expertise and stakeholder involvement were positively related to performance but made no statistically significant unique contribution when the other practices were considered simultaneously. The study, therefore, recommends that PPP project managers and road authorities strengthen project planning, particularly risk identification and documentation, enhance data management through regular updating, validation, reporting and use of data in decision-making, and give greater attention to continuous technical capacity development and meaningful stakeholder participation.