Nairobi: The struggle to Africanise a colonial town

The recent controversy over a street sign in Nairobi reflects the continuing struggle with its urban colonial legacy.

Francis Atwoli is a man of means. Fabulously rich, the pugnacious 72-year-old has been at the helm of the Central Organization of Trade Unions for two decades, somewhat ironically representing more than 2.5 million of Kenya’s poorly paid workers. Under his watch, the labour movement has been completely neutered as a political force, and he is more notable for his annual pleas to the government for a rise in the minimum wage every Labour Day than for actually working to improve their lot as he has his own. His Wikipedia page describes him striding the political landscape “like a colossus” and says his “chief achievement was getting a street named after him in May 2021”. However, that “achievement” has thrust him and his well-heeled neighbours into the heart of a controversy over memory and ownership of the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, that has been raging ever since it was established, well over a century ago. The decision by Acting Governor Anne Kananu to name the road after her “good friend and brother … in recognition of his selfless contribution and agitating for the rights of Kenyan workers in the last 54 years” has sparked outrage in many quarters and ignited a mini-war over a signpost. In the last few weeks, the signpost erected by her government to mark Francis Atwoli Road (formerly Dik Dik Road) has been vandalised several times, always being replaced a few days later. Internationally renowned activist Boniface Mwangi has vowed to pull it down and has been promised legal representation by prominent senior lawyers should he be prosecuted.