Dark history of repression behind us, let local artistes thrive and dream big

Prof Micere Mugo during a public lecture at Riara University

NAIROBI: The Kenya National Theatre (KNT) was once a part of the legacy of colonial Kenya’s settler history, notorious for its seizure of national spaces and resources, which it would then turn into exclusionary White monopolies. In those colonial days, existence was tiered and strictly segregated, with whites at the top, Asians next, Arabs third and Africans at the bottom. Thus, in keeping with colonial Kenya’s ladder of racial privilege, the national theatre prioritised productions from the colonial metropolitan and in particular, Britain.

Foreign shows would run uninterrupted for weeks on end, filling up the drama seasonal calendar. When an occasional African play was slotted in, it would be for just for a few shows. I recall how as late as during the mid-1970s, a play by the title A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (based on a book by Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart with lyrics/music by Stephen Sondheim), played for weeks on end, blocking efforts to stage one of Wole Soyinka’s plays – I forget which one. Ironically known as the Kenya national Theatre, it was once forbidden foreign land for ordinary Kenyans. Today, the KNT is nothing less than a piece of liberated zone.