Jomo Kenyatta's relationship with Mau Mau veterans who had fought in the anti-colonial rebellion was characterized by abandonment and betrayal. These men and women had participated in the armed struggle against colonialism, had sacrificed their livelihoods, had endured imprisonment and torture, and had contributed substantially to the conditions that made Kenya's independence possible. Yet when independence was achieved and Kenyatta came to power, Mau Mau veterans were largely excluded from the benefits of postcolonial Kenya and were frequently subjected to continued marginalization and discrimination.
Kenyatta's relationship to Mau Mau throughout his life remained ambiguous. During the 1950s, he was imprisoned and convicted on charges of complicity in organizing the rebellion, charges that were almost certainly unjust. His imprisonment and conviction gave him sympathy within Kenyan society and made him appear as a nationalist martyr. However, Kenyatta's actual relationship to the Mau Mau movement remained unclear. Some evidence suggests that he was aware of the movement but sought to maintain the Kenya African Union as a separate, legal political organization.
After independence, Kenyatta did not celebrate Mau Mau as a glorious struggle for liberation. Rather, he distanced himself from the movement and pursued policies that marginalized veterans. Veterans were not given prominent positions in the postcolonial government; they were not awarded special compensation or recognition for their sacrifices; and they were frequently subjected to surveillance and suspicion by the postcolonial security apparatus.
Kenyatta's dismissal of Mau Mau veterans reflected his broader political strategy of consolidating control over the postcolonial state and of controlling the narrative of Kenya's independence. Kenyatta wanted to be remembered as the principal architect of Kenya's independence, and he wanted the independence struggle to be understood as a peaceful, negotiated transition rather than as a violent rebellion. The continued presence and recognition of Mau Mau veterans would have complicated this narrative.
The marginalization of Mau Mau veterans created lasting grievances. These men and women had sacrificed substantially for the independence that Kenyatta benefited from, yet they were largely excluded from the postcolonial state's resources and opportunities. Some veterans lived in poverty, struggled with trauma from their participation in the rebellion, and felt abandoned by the postcolonial leadership. The betrayal of Mau Mau veterans became a prominent feature of Kenyan postcolonial history and a source of ongoing criticism of Kenyatta's legacy.
Kenyatta's treatment of Mau Mau veterans also reflected his effort to consolidate an elite-dominated postcolonial state. Mau Mau veterans, many of whom came from humble backgrounds and who had been radicalized by their experience in the rebellion, represented potential threats to the kind of elite-dominated postcolonial order Kenyatta was building. By marginalizing these veterans, Kenyatta ensured that they would not become a constituency demanding more radical postcolonial social change.
See Also
Kenyatta arrest October 21 1952 Kapenguria trial 1952-1953 Kenyatta and land reform Kenyatta Economic Policy Kenyatta Opposition Suppression
Sources
- David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged: Britain's Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire (New York: W.W. Norton, 2005), pp. 400-435.
- Wunyabari O. Maloba, Mau Mau and Kenya: An Analysis of a Peasant Revolt (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993), pp. 178-215.
- Caroline Elkins, Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya (New York: Henry Holt, 2005), pp. 400-437.