Nairobi MCAs pass motion for city streets to bear their names
Members of the Nairobi County Assembly now want city roads and streets named after the people serving in the current county government.
The MCAs passed a motion compelling Dr Evans Kidero’s government to review and change the names on roads and streets in the county.
The Assembly Deputy Speaker Ken Ngondi stated that the Governor, the Speaker, the majority and minority leaders plus himself should have roads named after them by virtue of being the first officials to serve under the devolved dispensation.
MIXED REACTIONS
There have been previous efforts to name roads in the county after the Governor and Senator Mike Sonko which have been met with mixed reactions.
In fact, ‘Dr Evans O Kidero Road’ at Galleria Mall, along Lang’ata Road, that was named in September 2014 had its sign pulled down last Christmas after public uproar.
‘Sonko road’ on the other hand was declared illegal by county officials after youth erected a signpost on the road connecting Outering Road to Buruburu estate through Mutindwa market shortly after President Uhuru launched the expansion of Outer Ring road.
The MCAs who supported the motion by Karen ward representative David Mberia said some roads in their wards are not named and should bear the names of ward representatives.
“Mr Speaker, some roads in Lakisama ward have no names and it would be a good thing to have my name on one of them as well as all MCAs,” Samuel Onduru said.
Mr Mberia had argued that some roads were given names that have no significance or history of the country.
“Mr speaker I do not want to be named after a road, but we have heroes, Some of the names on streets are completely insignificant to Kenyans,” he said.
PRECEDENCE
He described the naming of roads like Mogadishu, Monrovia, Lagos Road and Kampala Road as unplanned.
Mr Mberia argued that a precedence had been set by renaming Sandler to Kionange Street and Delamere to Kenyatta Avenue and that the motion would pave way for a structured process of renaming most roads.
He said Kenya has a tradition of naming roads, towns and even villages after their heroes.
The MCA said the tradition is at risk following the unplanned naming of some of the roads in the City.
Special elect Zulfa Mohamed called for gender parity in naming roads stating that the first lady Mrs Margaret Kenyatta deserved to have a road named after her for efforts to bring maternal deaths below zero.