The Moth, the world-renowned nonprofit dedicated to the art of live personal storytelling, returns to Nairobi on Saturday, November 7, 2026, for its seventh Mainstage event in the city, hosted once again by Kenyan media entrepreneur and women’s rights advocate Adelle Onyango.
The event will be held at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa’s LRC Auditorium and will bring together five storytellers from Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria and Sierra Leone. Anne Obure, Shakirah Namwanje, Odun Orimolade, Bernard Mbugua and Mahmood Bangura will share true, personal stories live and without notes.
This year’s Nairobi Mainstage is built around the theme “NOW OR NEVER”, featuring true stories about taking chances, throwing caution to the wind, making difficult choices and deciding that today is the day everything changes.
The theme takes on particular significance as the five storytellers recount very different moments when waiting was no longer an option and when they were forced to confront some of life’s most difficult challenges.
FIVE STORIES, FIVE MOMENTS OF NOW OR NEVER
Shakirah Namwanje, founder of the WOMANDLA Foundation Uganda and an HIV and sexual and reproductive health rights advocate, will share her personal story of confronting an HIV diagnosis while holding on to her dream of becoming a mother.
Sub-Saharan Africa was home to an estimated 26.3 million people living with HIV in 2024, according to UNAIDS, accounting for roughly two-thirds of the global total. The region recorded about 3,300 new HIV infections among adolescent girls and young women every week that year.
In Kenya, an estimated 1.3 million people were living with HIV in 2024, with young people aged 10 to 24 accounting for close to a third of all new infections, according to the National Syndemic Diseases Control Council.
Kenya has reduced new infections by three-quarters since 2010 and is on track to meet UNAIDS’ 2030 targets. However, stigma remains a major barrier, with a 2021 index showing that more than half of people living with HIV in Kenya delayed testing because of fear of how others would react.
Bernard Mbugua, a human rights defender and EndTB campaign champion, will tell the story of his TB diagnosis as a teenager and the choice he faced between his grandfather’s traditional and spiritual methods and modern medicine.
Tuberculosis remains one of the world’s leading infectious killers, with Africa carrying roughly a quarter of the global burden, according to the World Health Organization’s Global Tuberculosis Report 2025.
Kenya has made progress in tackling the disease, reducing TB incidence by more than a fifth and TB deaths by 35 per cent between 2020 and 2024. However, the country remains among the 30 countries identified by the WHO as having a high TB burden and a high TB/HIV burden, while national data suggests that close to a third of TB cases remain undetected each year.
Odun Orimolade, a Lagos-based artist, researcher and curator, will recount a surreal and unexpected encounter with an armed robber that unfolded during a crime, exploring the strange intimacy that can emerge in moments of danger.
Her story reflects experiences in cities across the continent, including Lagos and Nairobi, where concerns over crime and economic pressures continue to affect communities.
Anne Obure, a hydrotherapist, swimming coach and business coach, will describe a scuba-certification retreat that turned into something closer to survivalist training than a beach holiday.
Her story is about discovering unexpected reserves of resolve and making the decision to keep going when a plan no longer goes as expected.
For many young Kenyans, that determination is part of daily life. Recent Afrobarometer survey data found that health, the rising cost of living and unemployment are among the leading concerns Kenyan youth want addressed, with 43 per cent currently unemployed and looking for work.
Mahmood Bangura, a Sierra Leonean social scientist and educator who has worked on Ebola vaccine trials and other epidemiological studies, will share the story of becoming his niece’s guardian following a death in the family.
A father of two, Bangura will speak about his determination to give his niece the education and opportunities her mother would have wanted for her.
His story reflects a reality across Africa, where extended families often step in when parents are unable to care for children. SOS Children’s Villages estimates that 310,000 children in Sierra Leone grow up without their parents.
WHY STORYTELLING, AND WHY NOW
The Moth’s premise is that a true story told live and without notes can connect with an audience in ways that statistics alone cannot.
In a well-known classroom exercise by Stanford professor Chip Heath, students delivered one-minute persuasive pitches. Ten minutes later, only five per cent of listeners could recall a statistic, while 63 per cent remembered a story.
The Moth has tested that approach on a global scale since 1997, staging more than 70,000 true stories worldwide. Through its Global Community Program, it has also built an alumni network of more than 1,000 storytellers from more than 80 countries.
The Nairobi Mainstage continues that tradition by bringing personal experiences to the stage and putting a human face on issues that can often be difficult to understand through statistics alone.
This year’s stories include an HIV diagnosis, a TB diagnosis, a robbery, a challenging retreat and a guardian’s promise to his niece.
IN THEIR WORDS
“Every Moth Mainstage poses a question. In Nairobi this year it is simple: what do you do when the moment is now or never? Do you have the courage to leap? Kenya is home to a vast community of storytellers and a storytelling tradition, and it has been a centre for Moth storytelling workshops for almost 15 years. This year’s Pan-African cast, with stories of maternal and child health, safety, family, and sheer physical grit, are proof that Kenyan audiences don’t just watch daring; they live it.”
Sarah Austin Jenness, Executive Producer, The Moth
“Seven years into hosting this stage, I still find myself deeply moved by the stories that grace the Moth stage and how much connection they spark. This year’s storytellers are carrying personal stories: an HIV diagnosis, a TB recovery, a robbery, a retreat that nearly broke them, and a young man’s vow to raise his niece the way her mother would have. By the end of the night, every one of those stories will belong to all of us in that room, not just to them.”
Adelle Onyango, Host, The Moth Mainstage in Nairobi
“None of these five storytellers walked in thinking they had a story worth sharing on a global stage. What we discovered is that each of them had lived through a defining moment where they had to act, and simply couldn’t wait any longer. It was now or never. On November 7, Nairobi will get to hear five personal stories and experience the magical power of true stories told live.”
The Moth Mainstage in Nairobi will be held on Saturday, November 7, 2026, at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa’s LRC Auditorium in Nairobi.
The event, themed “NOW OR NEVER”, will be hosted by Kenyan media entrepreneur and women’s rights advocate Adelle Onyango, with storytellers Anne Obure, Shakirah Namwanje, Odun Orimolade, Bernard Mbugua and Mahmood Bangura taking to the stage.
Tickets are available through The Moth and KenyaBuzz.