How British settlers turned Nairobi into a house of vice

An aerial view of famous Koinange Street in 19674. [File, Standard]

When the British government spent PS6.5 million on the 'Lunatic Express', it hoped the newly-created protectorate, and later, the colony would pay off the public debt through commerce.

The government went on to encourage local young men to consider moving to East Africa for permanent settlement. Through advertisements in the British media, the government made sweet offers for large tracts of land if they made the move.

They were supposed to form the economic backbone of the colony and defray the costs of building the railways as well as generate cash to run the new administration.

However, this offer proved to be a double-edged sword for the colony. The first group to arrive was the white immigrant community from South Africa with tough social attitudes. According to Caroline Elkins book, Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya, this group was undercapitalised, settled on cheap land and hardly contributed to the local economy.

"Together they quickly became a drain on the colony's limited resources, demanding infrastructure like schools, roads, and hospitals, though offering little in return."

The settlers from Britain, on the other hand, were drawn from the aristocratic class but had seen a weakening of their economic position in Britain as family inheritance continued to shrink. They were eager to make the new colony their home and came with nobility to match.

"At [Mombasa] Africans loaded these lords and ladies onto railcars, along with their countless bags ... for the overnight trip to their new homes upcountry," wrote Elkins.

But as Elkins explains, this group was more interested in taking advantage of the new government infrastructure including land, labour and capital while "accustomed to a life not of working but of overseeing the work of those around them."

Soon, however, these settlers became notorious for their lives off the farms. "These privileged men and women lived an absolutely hedonistic lifestyle, filled with sex, drugs, drink, and dance, followed by more of the same," wrote Elkins.

In Nairobi's downtown hotels, they were known to drink heavily as they rode horses into hotel lobbies while enjoying the company of Japanese prostitutes from local brothels. As Elkins stated, their immoral escapades reached global notoriety with the joke making the rounds being, "Are you married or do you live in Kenya?