Nubians now remain the most marginalized of this country's ethnic communities:
1. They have never been given land rights to Kibra - a place they developed from jungle before the encroachment of the new estates and slums into the original 4197.9 acres. They are now squeezed into a mere 300 acres land - despite an increase in their population over the years.
2. Their citizenship being conveniently considered dubious. Most of the land from which they were evicted to give way to new estates remained idle for more than 30 years - only to be allocated for slum development to the 'correct' groups in complete disregard of Nubians views and feelings
3. Their children have missed education and employment opportunities due to lack of official identification (ID and Passports), because of their suspected background. Consequently they have suffered illiteracy and poverty.
Abandonement
As indicated in the first part of this document - the name Kibra is a Nubian word meaning jungle. A pure jungle is what our forefathers were faced with in the latter part of the 19th century - when the colonial British administration allocated the 4197.9 acres of land to the Kings African Riffle Nubian soldiers for the first generation settlement . Today we are in the seventh/eighth generation. The Nubians started developing this piece of land to a viable agricultural area with vibrant small scale farming activities, community and commercial centers where a rich, unique cultural presence was evident.
However, through the years, the natural growth and development of Kibra was affected by a number of external factors that gradually took away land that belonged to the Nubians.
Between 1920 and 1961, for instance, the following happened: The center Judicial Commission was set up in 1933, to look into the legal position of Kibra land residents ; the Nairobi-Kisumu railway line between Nairobi and Kikuyu was diverted to pass through Kibra between 1948 and 1954; Woodley estate was built; Royal Nairobi Golf course was started; the Royal Agricultural Society of Kenya was moved to its present location at Jamhuri Park between 1950 and 1953.
In 1953, the present Kibra Primary School was built by the British Government to support those who had settled in Kibra.
From 1962 onwards, the process of reclaiming land from the Nubians, in the name of development intensified - that is between 1962 to 1988.
The irony is that the Nubians hardly benefited from these modernization effort - as most newly built houses were allocated to other Kenyans from outside Kibra. Therefore the displaced Nubians were forced to seek refuge among relatives in villages that had not been affected - thus putting more pressure on the dwindling vacant land within the surviving villages.
Furthermore, a greater part of the areas vacated following the demolitions of the villages remained vacant well after the estates were built, giving rise to existing slums occupied by non-Nubians. It is no wonder that this informal settlement has made Kibra the second largest slum in Africa, and third largest in the world.
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