Abstract: Global warming and its associated climate impacts, particularly drought, present significant challenges worldwide. In Kenya, the National Drought Management Authority (NDMA) highlights that 80% of the country's land is classified as Arid or Semi-Arid Land (ASAL). Collaborative drought mitigation initiatives involving diverse stakeholders, including communities, government bodies, donor organizations, and political figures, are pivotal in mitigating the adverse effects of drought. Effective stakeholder management is crucial for the success of community-based projects. However, existing literature indicates a lack of full stakeholder engagement, leading to project failures. This study investigated project stakeholder management and the performance of drought mitigation projects in Makueni County, Kenya. The study's specific objectives were; to assess how stakeholder identification, training, engagement, and monitoring impact the performance of drought mitigation projects in Makueni County. The research was guided by normative stakeholder, transtheoretical, system, and control theories, which informed the study variables. The study employed a descriptive design in conjunction with purposive sampling to choose participants. The study included 16 projects from a target population of 43, whereby primary data was collected with the aid of a questionnaires and secondary data obtained from the NDMA. Data analysis involved both descriptive and inferential statistics. The study established that stakeholder identification, stakeholder training, stakeholder engagement and stakeholder monitoring were significant predictors of performance of drought mitigation projects in Makueni county. An adjusted R2=.726, taken as set predictors of stakeholder identification, stakeholder training, stakeholder engagement and stakeholder monitoring accounted for 72.6% of the variance in performance of drought mitigation projects in Makueni county. It was thus established that stakeholder management was an effective way of enhancing performance of drought mitigation projects in Makueni county.

Keywords: Project Stakeholder Management, Drought Mitigation Projects, Project Performance, stakeholder identification, stakeholder training, stakeholder engagement, stakeholder monitoring.

| DOI: 10.17148/IARJSET.2025.12113