Wajir Was Never the Edge of Kenya: Today We Stop Pretending It Was

By Mohammed Hersi

For sixty-three years, a quiet lie sat at the heart of our national story that Kenya had a centre and a margin, a place that mattered and a place that merely existed . The centre got the flags, the stadiums, the presidents and the cameras. The margin the old Northern Frontier District got soldiers, suspicion, and silence.

On the first of June 2026, that lie is being buried in the red soil of Wajir, and not a moment too soon. Madaraka Day means self-rule. Power belonging to the people. It is therefore the most fitting holiday imaginable to bring, for the very first time since independence, to a region that has spent six decades being ruled rather than included.

President Uhuru Kenyatta began the practice of carrying our national days beyond Nairobi. President Ruto continued it, Embu, Kericho, Bungoma, Kwale, Homa Bay, Kitui and now, on the seventh occasion away from the capital, he has done the thing that no government before dared to do. He has brought the Republic to Wajir.