Iconic KICC? Nahh!

Have you ever visited the Kenyatta International Conference Centre, KICC, or whatever it is that they call it these days. It is rather spiffy for a forty year old building. I am constantly surprised that its lifts still work. I am even more surprised that it hasn't caught on fire yet, even after the no-smoking-in-public-rule became law. It is an iconic building; certainly it has more character than Times Tower, or that hideous edifice the Kenya Commercial Bank Group is erecting in Upper Hill.

The KICC, however, is one of the most hostile public venues to visit in Nairobi these days, and not just because it is cheek-to-jowl with the foreign affairs ministry, Commission House (the home of the Public Service Commission) or a stone's thrown from Harambee House, the President's office when he is slumming it, and the Attorney-General's Chambers, or one fence away from Jogoo House, A and B, or the Supreme Court of Kenya. It is in one of the most sensitive zones: along City Hall Way, it faces City Hall, and across Harambee Avenue, it faces Vigilance House and the National Treasury Building. But all that doesn't make it a hostile building.

If you have been to the District of Columbia, and have had a chance to visit Capitol Hill, you will have experience their version of public safety and building security. Fences, so far as you can tell, serve to protect the people usually when construction is taking place on site. Otherwise, iconic buildings have discreet but effective security processes that allow the people to see, and sometimes touch, iconic building while keeping those who work in them safe from the likes of al Qaeda.

The KICC is iconic, but it is treated like a fragile piece of bone china that the Great Unwashed will shatter thoughtlessly. They must be corralled and controlled because they are, quite likely, a menace. It starts from even before you get to the building itself. Harambee Avenue, for the uninitiated, has become a "security" zone so there are these stupid rope "barriers' strung along the pavements to keep people as far away from fences as possible. Pavements, consequently, are permanently crowded because walking space has been reduced by half.

When you get to either the Harambee Avenue or City Hall Way gates, the same ritual applies. Line up in single file before the metal detectors. Empty your pockets of all, and I mean all, metallic objects. Walk through. Hear the beep. Raise your arms for the perfunctory wanding. Collect all your belongings off of the tray. Then respond to, "Unaenda wapi" by telling them to shove it! Then make your way to the security desk at the main door. This time leave your ID behind, get a visitors pass the proceed to the second metal detector-and-wand ritual and a n x-ray machine for your bomb-laden laptop or whatever. Then go in.

Now, if you are on crutches, pleas stay on the red carpet, even if the waziri is on his way. Stay on the carpet or you will be sorry. If you are blind, please bring your guide with you, or you will never get around. Ever. There are no braille signs and there are very few helpful staff, if any, around. Forget about the lifts if you are blind; you will never figure out how they operate an you will never now whether the right one has arrived for you. And if you are in a wheelchair and you somehow manage to get to your floor, you are still screwed because all floors are split level; you must either go up half a flight or down half a flight to get to the right office. Hopefully you have one of those snazzy wheelchairs that can climb stairs.

If there's ever a fire in that place, I hope the senators still keeping offices there have parachutes because everyone in the tower will die. Disaster preparedness seems to have been handled by the Flintstones. These people seem to have gone out of their way to make it as difficult as possible to move about and access stairwells. Oh, they are all dying in that fire.

The KICC is iconic, but its wonders are to be enjoyed from as far as possible. If you are not a known quantity - politician, really - keep as far away from it as possible, especially if you are a Wanjiku looking to take a few snaps of you and the building. You are just inviting the hostile attentions of the GSU, AP and private security liberally sprinkled all over the damn place.