Njuguna Mutonya
25 August 2007
opinion
Nairobi — Every time I visit my old friend Walter Mbotela in his Freretown house, I am engulfed by a sense of loss as I listen to his elucidation of history.
Walter, in his 90s, today is a gold mine of information and many a times I have directed researchers and documentary producers to him because of his rare insight into Kiswahili and the fact that he is today the human repository of the history of slavery.
When Freretown residents were fighting recently to reclaim ownership and control of their St Emmanuel Church (Kengeleni), one of the first churches in Kenya built by the freed slaves, I felt a tinge of anger.
Freretown was built as a settlement for freed slaves over a century ago and they have continued to live there and inter-married with locals.
Anybody doubting their intellectual and material ownership of the historical church would be branded many unpleasant and unedifying names.
There can be no Freretown without the descendants of the former slaves and there was a government edict in the colonial days which offered them special status which has been abused by post independence governments.
Their fate, like that of the Nubian community, seems to have been sealed.
Today, it is not only the church that is threatened by take-over but most of the land they live on is being encroached on by greedy politicians and public officials.
What should have been a model settlement preserved as a relic of the dark days of human debasement is today a slum neglected by the government and other institutions with no sense of history.
In other countries, Freretown would be a respected tourist and educational site but today you approach it at your own peril because of bad roads and dark alleys ruled by knife wielding goons.
I remember visiting Walter a few years ago at his Freretown Bar (now closed) only to find him mulling over one of his workers who had been killed just outside his bedroom window at night.
LAST YEAR, SOME BRITISH SCHOLars came to record Walter for material to help celebrate 200 years since the abolition of slavery and promised to take him to Ghana for the celebrations.
The celebrations are over; they never came back and Walter has no idea how they treated his valuable information.
The Government of Kenya, the Mombasa Municipal Council and the National Museums of Kenya all share the blame for the neglect of Freretown.
If Rabai Church could be turned into a Museum, why not Freretown?
Ten kilometres out of Orlando Florida in Orange County, there is a small town called Eatonville which is one of the first black-only settlements in America.
Today, Eatonville is recorded in the American Register of Historical Centres and hosts a festival every January in honour of their most celebrated daughter - author Zora Neale Hurston for whom a museum of fine art is also dedicated.
Walter, having lost his wife a few years ago, is living alone, occasionally banging on his old Olympia typewriter on which he has produced countless articles for Kenyan newspapers whenever his arthritic fingers give him a respite.
Until recently, he was providing cryptic crosswords for Taifa Leo - a feat that never ceased to amaze me.
He has a library of rare books which could easily be stolen by some of the unschooled rascals that roam the alleys behind his house.
When our social scientists spend millions holding workshops in five-star hotels ruminating on moveable and immovable heritage, you just wonder what they are talking about without noticing people like Walter - an amazing hulk with loads of wit.
Freretown is a challenge to scholars, public officers and people of goodwill who can help to turn it into what it ought to be - a heritage centre for all of us.
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