Friday, August 23
Petersallee to Maji-Maji Allee: Street honouring colonial murderer gets renamed
Carl Peters was known by the people who suffered under his rule as the “bloody hand”. In the 1890s, his brutal regime over the area then known as German East Africa (today Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi) saw punitive expeditions and the mass murderer of native people, as well as widespread sexual slavery. Nevertheless, he has been honoured ever since in Germany for his services to their former empire. Today, after years of campaigning, this street will be renamed.
Petersallee, in the so-called African quarter of Wedding, is changing its name. Part of the street will become known as Maji-Maji-Allee – named for a resistance struggle in Tanzania against German rule – and part will bear the name of Anna Mungunda Alle – a hero of the anti-apartheid struggle in Namibia.
August 23 is the International Day Against Slavery, and the inauguration of these new streets will be accompanied by a memorial march in memory of the resistance fighters worldwide (in the Maji-Maji war alone, German forces killed as many as 300,000 people). The memorial march begins at 1pm on the corner of Kameruner Straße/Müllerstraße in Wedding. From 3pm, a festival will celebrate the new name at Manga Bell Platz.
