Community-led upgrade to a Nairobi slum could be a model for Africa

Mukuru, one of Kenya’s largest informal settlements, has cleaned up its act with improved water, roads and sanitation

A newly paved thoroughfare in Mukuru, Nairobi. In previous years the same road was described as ‘more of an open sewer’. Photograph: Peter Muiruri

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Peter Muiruri

Fri 12 Nov 2021 07.00 GMT

The people who live in Mukuru, one of the vast, sprawling “informal settlements” in Nairobi, used to dread the rains, when the slum’s mud-packed lanes would dissolve into a soggy quagmire of sewage, stagnant water and slimy rubbish.

But a few years ago, things began to change. On a newly paved road Benedetta Kasendi is selling sugar cane from a cart. It gives her a clean platform, somewhere she can keep her wares tidy. Her biggest challenge now is what to do with the sugar-cane waste as she does not want to clog up Mukuru’s revamped sewers.

“You can have a piece of sugar cane here. The place is clean now,” Kasendi tells Patrick Njoroge, programme officer at the Akiba Mashinani Trust (AMT), a fund that raises capital for slum improvement projects. Njoroge has been working for the past 10 years on a masterplan for Mukuru, and he knows how filthy the place used to be.

I used to walk 30 minutes to fetch water. Today, that walk has been reduced to two minutes

Diana Mwende, resident

“This road was more of an open sewer. It is not a place you could have wished to spend an extra second. Walking was dangerous as one risked falling into the sewer. This lady set up here after the road was rehabilitated – slum upgrading spurs new businesses, however small,” says Njoroge.

A few metres away, Diana Mwende lines up jerrycans at a kiosk where free fresh water is available. “I used to walk 30 minutes to fetch water. Today, that walk has been reduced to two minutes since these water points were installed in our neighbourhood,” she says.

The improvements save her more than time: “I used to pay 400 shillings [£2.70] for water every month and 1,000 shillings to access the communal toilet. Now I have a clean toilet by my house.”

Kasendi and Mwende are among thousands who have benefited from a community-based programme to upgrade one of Africa’s biggest informal settlements and whose success will be used to transform similar slums in Kenya and beyond.

The ambitious project follows consultations with more than 40 organisations led by the Muungano Alliance, an umbrella body driving reforms in Kenya’s informal settlements, and including universities, civil societies, the private sector and Nairobi county government. The goal is to make the slum a “healthy, functional city neighbourhood”.

Community involvement in improving the sprawling 243-hectare (600 acre) slum was the key. A resident was chosen to represent groups of households and thousands of people were asked for their views; 250 community mobilisers were engaged to raise awareness of the project. Residents were trained to collect data – a huge task given the size of Mukuru, which has a population generally estimated to be at least 400,000. Every latrine, water tap and electricity pole in the settlement was mapped.

One of the most urgent issues was toilets, and there were many requests to replace the 3,800 filthy pit latrines. Now, 1,000 households have access to flushing toilets and running water.

The government has approved the construction of 13,000 new houses in Mukuru, the first social housing project in Kenya. “So far, half of the 52km [32 miles] of roads earmarked for Mukuru have been completed, and residents are already benefiting from a couple of new hospitals that offer 24-hour medical services,” says Njoroge.

Mukuru was originally allocated by the Kenyan government to politicians and owners of businesses in the 1980s and 1990s to develop light industries within a two-year period. Failure to do so would see the grantees lose their claims to the land.

Mukuru in 2010, before the upgrade to the slum began. An estimated 700,000 people shared 3,800 filthy pit latrines – and had to pay for access to them. Photograph: Tony Karumba/AFP/Getty

As years passed without any development, slum landlords descended on the vacant land and built unregulated structures for rent. Mukuru eventually grew to nearly 10% of Nairobi’s population, all living in squalor.

There are other hazards too: in September 2011, more than 100 people died in an explosion after a fuel spill in a section of the slum known as Sinai. The victims had rushed to collect leaking fuel when it was ignited. Illegal electricity connections have resulted in similar tragedies.

Residents have lived under the shadow of eviction by those originally given the land. Those who had settled on land set aside for public utilities such as roads, railways and power lines have fought endless legal battles with authorities trying to bring some form of order, while others have died when the land flooded. People in Mukuru also have to deal with cartels controlling basic services such as toilets and rubbish disposal. It makes for a tense atmosphere.

Jane Weru, executive director of the AMT, part of the Muungano Alliance, was involved in the upgrading plans from the outset. She has been championing the rights of slum dwellers for 20 years, with little input from the authorities. But Mukuru is the first informal settlement in Africa to be declared a special planning area (SPA), with the Kenyan government hoping to replicate this model in other slums such as Kibera, Mathare, Korogocho and Kawangware.

The little money each household had was being gobbled up by cartels

Jane Weru, Akiba Mashinani Trust

“We had not planned to go to Mukuru,” says Weru. “A resident came to us and requested our help in buying the land on which his house stood from the original owner. First, we thought it was just this one person who needed help but more came forward with similar issues. Insecure land tenure, where close to 94% of people are tenants, has led to poor planning and hence lack of basic services. It was a systemic problem that needed a broader and multidisciplinary approach.”

The trust also realised that living in a slum was expensive. “The little money each household had was being gobbled up by cartels,” says Weru. “The 2,000 shillings each household paid as monthly rent amounted to more than 180m shillings [£1.2m], yet those collecting this cash paid no taxes. The cartels were charging exorbitant fees for water and sanitation services, while endangering people’s lives through illegal electricity connections.”

In 2017, when Mukuru became part of the city administration’s SPA upgrading scheme, a report found slum dwellers faced a “poverty penalty”, paying more for basic services than those in richer suburbs.

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The report found: “Mukuru households pay 45%-142% more in their electricity bills than residents enjoying formal [mains connection]. The poverty penalty for water is especially crippling as slum dwellers usually consume less water, at lower quality, but at higher costs than residents with formal provision. Residents pay 172% more per cubic metre of water than rates paid by residents living in formal areas.”

Mukuru’s upgrading programme has attracted attention in other countries across Africa, including Zambia, Malawi, Sierra Leone and Ghana.

Jesse DeMaria-Kinney, the of the Adaptation Research Alliance, a group of nearly 100 organisations helping vulnerable communities says: “Because of the specific risks these communities face due to climate change, we have to urgently support initiatives with inclusive action over rhetoric.

“Bringing slum dwellers into the research and policy aspects can ensure that outcomes are appropriate, desirable, actionable and lead to improvements in their lives,” he says.