How is the Casablanca Club in Mombasa Nowadays?

Well, the last time I checked, the Casablanca club in Mombasa was still going strong. It remains one of the few vibrant joints that have withstood the test of time in Mombasa CBD. I don’t know how well it has been able to withstand the Covid-19 crisis, but I know that it is quite a resilient establishment which has been through worse situations before. It is also a recognized landmark in Mombasa, which fun-loving people who find themselves around the Mapembeni area of Mombasa CBD are always likely to consider visiting.

There was a time when the area around Casablanca club in Mombasa would be full of activity even during the wee hours of the night. But that seems to have changed sometime in 2014, when the Police Service working in concert with the Mombasa County Government embarked on a campaign that seemed to be aimed at getting rid of nightlife in Mombasa CBD. For a few weeks, people who were found outdoors within the Mombasa CBD were ruthlessly arrested, with some respectable people often finding themselves being presented before the Mombasa Municipal Court charged with being ‘homeless’. The net effect of this was to induce long-term fear in people, turn Mombasa CBD into a deserted town – a town that, as one fella put it, goes to sleep at 8 Pm just like Kinango Town. But lately, there had been efforts to get Mombasa CBD nightlife going again, before the Covid-19 curfews and other restrictions took effect.

Some of the clubs that were Casablanca’s contemporaries – you know, the likes of Kenya Bar and Millenium Bar at SabaSaba have long closed. Kenya Bar seems to actually have been forgotten: I remember stopping quite a number of tuktuk riders and requesting for them to take me to Kenya Bar former location, and they couldn’t figure out where it was. There seems to be a generation of people who came to Mombasa long after the Kenya Bar era. Meanwhile, Millenium Bar seems to have gone, though its place was taken over by another establishment which is trying its best to rebuild the niche. Establishments like Club Rio are still there, with operations here and there.

Much of Mombasa’s fun-loving crowd seems to have moved to the suburbs/neighborhoods. Clubs like Jamsa in Likoni, Backyard, Masters and the whole range of clubs on the Bamburi Mtambo road as well as establishments like Magongo Night Club profiting quite a bit. So have establishments like Tudor Paradise in Tudor area, and Landmark Hotel in what previously used to be Akamba Handicraft Bar, Apollo Bar in Kwa Hola, Last Minute Bar, Big Brothers Changamwe, Sweetwaters Changamwe and Bubbles in Kongowea. But for sure, something seems to have changed with the emergence of new ideas within the Mombasa CBD, where there are some folks who seem to be uncomfortable with the idea of people having fun there! Getting a chance to establish a new entertainment joint within Mombasa CBD seems to be becoming more and more of a tall order. Still, the Mombasa CBD-based establishments like Casablanca and the ones around Tononoka stadium, including the one known as Head1/4s still maintain a lot of relevance, as there will always be people looking to have fun in the Mombasa CBD. And for many, Casablanca will always be the first port of call.