Two buildings that tell the story of Mandera

Kenya: Two landmarks standing side by side but dissimilar like fraternal twins represent the best of the past and the present of Mandera, the northern Kenya town that embraces both Ethiopia and Somalia frontiers.

One is a resort hotel that opened its doors to the public only weeks ago, the other a government guest house under the aegis of Arid and Semi-arid Lands project.

The aptly named Arid Lands Guest House, bespeaks the name by its very look, a weather beaten collection of structures that have seen better days as opposed to the upmarket edifice that is the Red Sea resort, resplendently posh just across the wall.

But why the tag “Red Sea” in a terrain where no semblance of a sea exists even in the wildest of imaginations?

A huge smile spreads across the face of Abdurahman Mohamed, a youthful entrepreneur who runs Mandera’s closest thing to five-star scenario.

“Yes, why Red Sea?” I prod Mohamed as his smile thaws, revealing a serious young mind trained on nothing but success.

“I only run the business as I have told you, but the owner confided to me that he was attracted to an Egyptian resort on the Red Sea with a similar design and drenched in temperatures similar to Mandera’s, hence his choice of the name.

Back to the fatigued twin across the wall that offered the only decent and secure accommodation before Red Sea came to life.

Visitors

Among its VIP guests going by the visitors’ book are President Uhuru Kenyatta on his campaign trail as Kanu presidential candidate in 2002 and Deputy President William Ruto in 2012 when he was the Minister for Agriculture.

Others include former Prime Minister Raila Odinga, Narc Kenya Chairman Martha Karua while campaigning to be president in 2013, former Minister for Northern Kenya and other arid lands Mohamed Elmi and former Commissioner General of Police David Kimaiyo among others.

The list of big names goes on and on. Governor Ali Roba of Mandera County lived and worked from the facility for well over a year between April 2013 and June 2014 according to Mr Alio and available records.

The governor, like other prominent guests at the nonprofit making facility, slept on a five by six foot bed and would join other guests to follow news and current events at a lone public television set. That has changed, but the pleasantly antiquated beds wrought out of steel remain the same.

 

The Mandera County Drought Co-ordinator, Hussein Mohamed Alio, says the beds that look simple by VIP standards are the same ones where Uhuru (now president), Ruto, Karua, Elmi and kimaiyo slept on when they visited.

He says Raila did not spend a night in Mandera on his visit. “He is the only VIP guest who has visited us but not slept here,” he says.

Devolution brought with it novelty investments unthinkable for Mandera a few years back. Governor Roba while officially opening Red Sea resort on February 3, said: “We can now comfortably host a national conference in Mandera yet an investment conference was impossible not so long ago. That is how much we have grown in a brief space of time. More peeps ahead”.

Since, January 2015 when the resort flung its doors open to guests, those who have slept on its beds, according to Mohamed, include Industrialisation and Enterprise Cabinet Secretary Adan Mohamed who hails from the county, flamboyant Nairobi Senator Mike Mbuvi Sonko, Garissa Senator Yusuf Haji, Laikipia Senator GG Kariuki and Mandera Senator Billow Kerrow.

“Our seasons are determined by the price of goats and sheep that are the mainstay of the economy here and the occasional rain. Our people celebrate drops of rain that bring grass and pasture for the livestock by spending the little they have, relaxing,” says Mohamed. Thanks to devolution, in the wake of Red Sea are a string of upcoming classic hotels, among them Mandera Palace Hotel nearing completion with 52 rooms, the Hill View Hotel with 30 rooms and Hanan Guest House with 13 rooms.

To add to the changing face of the torrid northern Kenya town embracing two international frontiers within a walking distance are tarmac roads currently under construction to mop the notorious dust.