How Deni ya mkoloni created Adams Arcade along Ngong road

By Editor | 7yrs ago | 2 min read

Adams Arcade was opened after four years of snail-paced construction in 1959, a whole two dozen years before Sarit Centre became the largest mall in East and Central Africa.

Adams Arcade, previously called ‘Colonial’ — because of Colonial Stores that preceded it — was the brainchild of businessman Abdul Habib Adam.

Okuyu makangas plying the Kikuyu-Thogoto-Dagoretti-Nairobi route then called it ‘Koronia!’ due to that small matter of ‘shrubbing.’

The story goes that Abdul Habib Adam, owner of Reliance Motor Transport, did so much business with the colonial government during World War II years, but arrears kept piling such that eventually, he was compensated with the land on which the shopping centre now stands.

World War II ended in 1945. But some odieros chose to stay and Woodley Estate was created as a housing scheme for them in 1948, the year Adam transferred Reliance Motor Transport to Alimohammed Janmohammed, according to Kenya Gazette notice of May 1, that year.

But sizing that residents of Woodley Estate who neighboured his land would need a shopping centre saw Abdul Habib musing initial drawings for his arcade. But there was a problem. City Council couldn’t approve them. Abdul Habib was not an architect.

A South African architect came to his rescue. Approvals done, construction began in 1954 and by its completion, the arcade starred nine, three-bedroom flats with balconies. Colonial Stores served as logistical depot for British military during World War II, and with an easy transition, the first tenants were British soldiers and their families after functions of Colonial Stores were transferred to Eastleigh Airbase, Nairobi.

Adams Arcade — where Java first opened its chain of coffee houses — had the Total petrol station and the post office (both still stand as remnants of business resilience), a grocery, a Bata shop, Deacons shop, a butchery, Stanchart bank, a chemist and Bachelor’s Bakery (later Kencake Bakery), which drew customers from all corners of taifa tukufu with its delicious pastries.

Adams Arcade also had the late lamented Metropole Cinema, which opened shop in 1964 - a decade before Abdul Habib Adam died at the Nairobi Hospital on March 4, 1974.

It was strange how two years before his death, Abdul Habib was the face behind Halal Meat Products, a private abattoir, which oddly, was allocated 11.5 acres of government land in Ngong, where Sh30 million of public funds was splashed on its construction! After his death, the firm fell into the hands of Mohamed Ali Modha and his wife, Fatuma Tunny Modha.

Questions by the Auditor General DG Njoroge on how the public bankrolled a private enterprise saw it closed in 1978. Demand for game meat exports led to its reopening eight years later as a subsidiary of Kenya Meat Commission. The Modhas sued the government for Sh94 million over irregular acquisition. The matter was settled out of court. But the entrepreneurial legacy of Abdul Habib Adam still remains at Adams Arcade.