The girl was young, perhaps in her mid-20s, and so she still had that youthful spring in her step. She was walking along Moi Avenue a few minutes past midday yesterday when she decided to dart across the road.
She made it past the vehicular chaos of the service lane a few metres past Hotel Ambassadeur, across the Moi Avenue lane that heads towards the Railways Roundabout, and onto the median.
She looked left as she stood on the median, the narrow strip of land that separates the opposite lanes of the road. Two cars passed, and then she jumped onto the lane. She had barely made two steps when she heard the screeching sound of tyres against tarmac and the screaming epithets of an enraged man.
She turned right just in time to see the man riding a bicycle, and behind him a boda boda careering towards her on the wrong side of the road. They both gave her that red-eyed menacing look as they swerved to avoid hitting her, and as she made the dash across the remainder of the road, they rode on and disappeared into the thick of the Railways Roundabout. She had made it, but only just.
A few metres away, at the seat of the County at City Hall, Governor Johnson Sakaja, was preparing to give his State of the County address, an annual ritual adopted by rulers to share their versions of progress reports and reiterate their commitment to deliver on their election promises.
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That episode on Moi Avenue lasted less than 10 seconds, but it was a powerful metaphor for what has become of Nairobi, an African metropolis that appears to be teetering on the edge of disaster.
In the three-or-so hours that we toured the city, we came face-to-face with streetwise unruliness, crumbling infrastructure, the ireful gaze of livid council askaris, snail-pace traffic, and chaos that made apocalyptic scenarios seem like child play.
photographer Sila Kiplagat immortalised this urban bedlam in a series of photos as we walked around the city to talk to its residents about their fears, hopes and misgivings about Mr Sakajas city.
We had barely stepped outside when we saw an old Land Rover break-down truck reverse at high speed to block a motorist who was pulling out of a parking slot on Kimathi Street. Four men, two in City Council Inspectorate uniform and the other two in civilian attire, jumped out of the truck, registration number KTH 697, and started confronting the driver.
City inspectorate officers are required by law to only use official vehicles for patrol and clamp-downs, but unruly officers often collaborate with private break-down services to harass motorists and impound their cars. The askaris let go of the driver after the commotion attracted members of the public, but as they drove off in their rickety truck, it was clear that Mr Sakajas directive soon after assuming office in November 2022 that city council inspectorate should stop harassing motorists no longer held.
And that is not the only pledge that the Governor is being accused of not meeting. To audit Mr Sakaja, one needs to go back to his colourful manifesto, which is available on the Nairobi City County website. By recent standards, Mr Sakajas campaign was messianic. He promised order, dignity and hope to the millions who call Nairobi home, and on social media insisted lazima iwork.
It didnt take long, however, for some to start complaining that Mr Sakaja was all dimples and no charm. With his directive, in November 2022, that City Hall should stop impounding boda bodas and rogue passenger service vehicles, he opened up the city for abuse. Thousands of boda bodas have now taken over city streets. They ride everywhere, hog entire streets, park anywhere, harass vehicular motorists, and maim pedestrians.
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Woodley MCA Mwangi Njihia had argued at the time that most streets, pedestrian walkways and on-street parking in the city centre had been illegally turned into bus stops and parking slots for passenger service vehicles, leading to congestion and, in extreme cases, fatal accidents.
Yesterday, noted that buses had been allowed to take up almost the entire breadth of the street at the Kencom stop. Initially, buses were only allowed to drop and pick passengers here, and to only parallel-park for a few seconds as they did so. Now they are allowed both angle and perpendicular parking, which means their frames extend from the kerbs and gobble up half of the road behind them.
At the same time, hawkers now rule the streets. Initially kicked out of the city centre, they have been allowed to colonise entire streets. From the entire stretch of Tom Mboya, to Ronald Ngala, to Mfangano, to Sheik Kar
