Paper short abstract:

As with all Local Authorities in Kenya, Nakuru Municipal Council has since independence, been systematically disempowered by central government. This paper examines the strategies the council has pursued for economic and political survival in the absence of official responsibilities.

Paper long abstract:

Contemporary studies of urban governance in Africa often explore the emergence of alternative actors and service provides in cities across the continent. Notwithstanding the value of such contributions, they tend to neglect conventional authorities and their shifting roles and relationships with urban dwellers. Specifically, the position of local government in Africa remains under-theorised and poorly examined. This paper attempts to redress this by considering the experience of Nakuru, Kenya's fourth largest town, and the activities of its Municipal Council since 1963.

Empowered by the departing colonial government, Local Authorities in Kenya had, by 1970, lost responsibility for all major services. In the absence of duties - and attendant funding - councillors and staff have had to carve out alternative ways to provide meaning and reward to local office. This paper describes, historically, Nakuru Municipal Council's attempts at establishing itself as the primary gatekeeper to the local economy. Through decisions over licensing, taxation, levies and rates, the Council has controlled access to the town's market economy. This has simultaneously imbued the Council with authority and satisfied the rent-seeking prerogative of politics in Kenya. But as general service provision in the town declined in the 1970s and 1980s, how and to what extent was the Council able to retain any legitimacy for those who lived and worked there?