It is not security that rouses Inspector-General Davide Mwole Kimaiyo and his National Police Service to rope off large swathes of public spaces. Every public building which houses a ministry, department or agency of the government or any arm of the government has a complement of police to guard the building. I used to think that the reason these places had armed police was because they contained deep government secrets that would jeopardise the security of the State if they were revealed. So the State and its government deployed armed police to keep its secrets safe.
I also believed that the men and women who worked in these places were valued by their government, and that their security and safety was of paramount importance. If you were a bad man and you intended to cause a civil servant harm, the armed police would dissuade you about targetting the civil servant while he was in his place of work.
How naive! These are all rational reasons for the continued shrinking of public spaces available to the public. Of course, enhanced security measures are needed in the wake of Westgate, Mpeketoni and Mombasa. Of course government building contain secrets that must be protected. And of course civil servants must be protected when delivering services to the people. But these reasons do not explain the active hostility of the government towards its people.
A clue lies in how the government treats its poor and how its security measures are directed overwhelmingly at the poor. Take Nairobi as an example. A cosmopolitan city, it's population is estimated at about four million people. It's population of the poor is quite likely half of that, spread out in low-cost estates and slums. Nairobians who came up in Eastlands know these low-income estates very well: Ofafa Jericho, Jerusalem, Makongeni, Makadara, Maringo, Kaloleni, Shauri Moyo, Mbotela. They are also very familiar with the slums: Mathare Valley, Korogocho, Kibera, Mukuru.
Areas where the poor reside are startlingly similar: electricity and piped water connections are notable for their absence; social facilities such as schools, healthcare centres, police stations, playing grounds, markets, roads, sewerage systems, drainage systems, footpaths, street lights - all the things that contribute to a civic system are missing. When crimes are committed by residents against residents, first there is not place to report the crimes and, second, if a report is successfully made, the police will not investigate, the public prosecutors will not prosecute. As a result, crime is rife in these areas. And as a result, there is no incentive to "civilise" the poor; it is easier for the government and the rich to exclude them from the "other" Nairobi.
This has been achieved rather easily. First, public transport was "liberalised". The old subsidised system was run down and then moth-balled. The cost of public transport is beyond the reach of a majority of the poor in Nairobi. One only needs to drive along Mombasa Road in the morning and evening to see the armies of the poor marching off to work. With expensive public transport, few of the poor will venture into the city centre or the districts where the rich reside.
Second, public places were made as hostile as possible to the poor. If you wish to gain access, for example, to Sheria House, or the Kenyatta International Conference Centre, or Nyayo House, you must undergo enhanced scrutiny by the armed policy and the private security who complement them. You must state your name, provide proof of identity, empty your pockets, and finally state what your business is. It is meant to be as humiliating as possible. It is meant to intimidate. It is very effective at keeping the poor out. Once you get past the armed guards, you must get past secretaries and clerks who, sometimes it seems to be deliberate, will withhold vital information needed to complete your transaction.
Third, because the poor are likely to be on foot wherever they go, where they walk is slowly being stolen from them. The city centre is demarcated by Tom Mboya Street; one half is for the poor and they are not welcome in the other half. Look at the ridiculous ropes Inspector-General Kimaiyo has deployed outside public buildings and how this has inspired everyone else. These security measures do not affect motorists; they affect people who have walked long distances. The additional spikes we have placed to prevent people from sitting down and the sneaky removal of public benches simply tells us that the poor are not welcome in the posher bits of the city centre. We have established a hostile and disengaging urban scenery and employed a hostile architecture designed to exile the poor from our sight and we wonder why the poor refused to sympathise with us when our friends were murdered during the Westgate siege.
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