Speke Conference Centre

The Review Conference is being held at the Speke Conference Centre, which is named after John Hanning Speke. Speke was a British officer who led expeditions to central Africa and who is credited with 'discovery' of Lake Victoria, which was then believed to be the source of the Nile River. It is an odd honour, reflective of a Eurocentric way of writing history, even here in Africa. After all, it seems beyond dispute that the first humans evolved not far from here, and that we are all their descendants. Presumably our African ancestors had discovered Lake Victoria a few years before Mr Speke.