Case study: Kenya's road to independence – Decolonisation in Africa with Case Studies of Ghana and Kenya (Senior 3 History and Citizenship) | Ganzaa

Decolonisation in Africa with Case Studies of Ghana and Kenya

Lessons

Senior 3 · History and Citizenship

Decolonisation in Africa with Case Studies of Ghana and Kenya

4 lessons

Lesson 4 of 4

Case study: Kenya's road to independence

25 min

An apology of sorts, fifty years later

On 6 June 2013 the British Foreign Secretary, William Hague, told Parliament that the government had settled a court case brought by elderly Kenyans who had been held in British detention camps during the 1950s. The settlement included:

payment of a settlement sum in respect of 5,228 claimants, as well as a gross costs sum, to the total value of £19.9 million. The Government will also support the construction of a memorial in Nairobi to the victims of torture and ill-treatment during the colonial era.

Source A. Statement to Parliament on the settlement of Mau Mau claims, UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 6 June 2013. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

Analysing the source. A government rarely admits that its officials tortured people. That Britain paid compensation half a century later tells us how violent the end of empire in Kenya was, and how long its memory lasted. Unlike Ghana, Kenya won independence only after a war. This lesson asks why.

Definition

Settler colony: a colony where many Europeans settled permanently, owned land and had political power, such as Kenya, Algeria and Southern Rhodesia.

Squatter: in colonial Kenya, an African family allowed to live and farm on a European's land in return for labour.

Mau Mau: the name usually given to the armed movement, mostly of Kikuyu, Embu and Meru people, which called itself the Kenya Land and Freedom Army and fought British rule from 1952.

Loyalists: Africans who supported the colonial government, many of them in the Home Guard.

State of Emergency: a period when a government gives itself special powers, such as arrest and detention without trial.

Detention: imprisonment without trial.

Why Kenya's road was violent

Land. The best farmland in the cool central highlands, the "White Highlands", was reserved for Europeans from 1902 to 1961. Many Kikuyu were pushed into crowded reserves or became squatters on settler farms, and after the war settlers began to expel squatters.
Settler power. A few tens of thousands of European settlers dominated the colony's politics and opposed African majority rule.
Poverty and the colour bar. Wages were low in Nairobi, and Africans faced racial discrimination in jobs, housing and services.
Blocked peaceful politics. The Kenya African Union (KAU), led from 1947 by Jomo Kenyatta, asked for land and representation, but made little progress. Younger, more radical men organised secret oaths of unity and prepared to fight.
Ex-servicemen who had fought for Britain in Burma and elsewhere brought military experience (Unit 5).

Source B. Soldiers of the King's African Rifles carry supplies with pack animals while on patrol against Mau Mau fighters, between 1952 and 1956. Notice that the soldiers are African: Africans fought on both sides of this war. Photo: UK Ministry of Defence, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The process, step by step

Figure 1. Kenya's road ran through a long war before negotiation. Not drawn to scale.

The Emergency, 1952. After a series of killings, Governor Evelyn Baring declared a State of Emergency on 20 October 1952. Kenyatta and about 180 other leaders were arrested; Kenyatta was convicted in 1953 of leading Mau Mau, a charge he denied, and imprisoned.
The forest war, 1952 to 1956. Mau Mau fighters, led by men such as Dedan Kimathi, fought from the forests of the Aberdare range and Mount Kenya. British troops, the King's African Rifles, the police and the African Home Guard hunted them. Kimathi was captured in October 1956 and hanged in February 1957.
Violence against civilians, on both sides. Much of the war was fought among Africans: Mau Mau attacked loyalists, most terribly at Lari in March 1953, where official estimates put the dead at 74, and security forces then killed about 150 people in reprisals. The government detained tens of thousands of Kikuyu without trial in camps and moved over a million into guarded villages. In the camps torture was used; at Hola, on 3 March 1959, guards beat eleven detainees to death.
The turn to negotiation. The Hola killings caused an outcry in Britain. The Emergency ended in January 1960, and at the Lancaster House conference in London in 1960 Britain accepted that Kenya would have an African majority. New parties formed, KANU and KADU; Kenyatta was released in 1961 and led KANU to victory in the elections of May 1963.
Independence. Kenya gained self-government on 1 June 1963 (Madaraka Day) and independence on 12 December 1963 (Jamhuri Day), with Kenyatta as Prime Minister. It became a republic a year later.

The human cost

Group	Deaths during the Emergency (estimates)	Source of the estimate
Mau Mau fighters and suspects	12,000 to over 20,000, including 1,090 men executed by hanging	Historian David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged (2005)
African civilians killed by Mau Mau	1,819 officially; Anderson thinks about 5,000	Colonial government figures; David Anderson
African police and soldiers on the government side	about 3,000	Wikipedia, "Mau Mau rebellion"
British military personnel	95	Wikipedia, "Mau Mau rebellion"

Table 1. The human cost. Numbers differ between sources because records were incomplete and some deaths were never recorded; treat them as estimates.

Jomo Kenyatta, President of Kenya, at State House, Nairobi, on 15 June 1966. Imprisoned by the British from 1952 to 1961, he led Kenya to independence and called on Kenyans to put the past behind them. Photo: Moshe Pridan, Israel Government Press Office, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Worked example: comparing two roads

Question: Compare the ways in which Ghana and Kenya won independence. (8 marks)

Similarity. Both were British colonies whose nationalists were inspired by the war, the Manchester Congress of 1945 and the example of Asia; in both, the leader (Nkrumah, Kenyatta) was imprisoned by the British and then released to lead the government.

Difference 1: method. Ghana's road was mainly peaceful: a mass party, Positive Action and elections. Kenya's included an armed rebellion, the Mau Mau war of 1952 to 1960, before negotiation.

Difference 2: why. Ghana had few settlers and a wealthy African cocoa economy; Kenya had a powerful settler community holding the best land, which blocked reform.

Difference 3: timing and cost. Ghana became independent in 1957 with relatively few deaths; Kenya in 1963 after a war in which thousands died.

Tip

Remember Kenya as "Land, Emergency, Lancaster, Liberty": land grievances; the Emergency of 1952; the Lancaster House conference of 1960; independence on 12 December 1963.

Warning

Be balanced about violence. Don't present the war as "terrorists against the government" (the colonial view) or as heroes against villains. Mau Mau fighters killed civilians, especially African loyalists; the colonial forces detained, tortured and executed on a much larger scale. Use the estimates in Table 1, say who produced them, and avoid sensational detail.

Discuss

In 2013 Britain paid compensation and funded a memorial in Nairobi. Can compensation and memorials help a society heal after violence? Compare with the ways Rwanda remembers the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi and works for unity and reconciliation.

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Practice

What were the "White Highlands", and why did they matter to the Kikuyu?
Who led the Kenya African Union from 1947?
When was the State of Emergency declared, and what happened to Kenyatta?
Give one example of violence by Mau Mau and one by the colonial forces.
What happened at Hola in March 1959, and why was it important?
Using Figure 1, list the steps from the end of the Emergency to independence.
Using Table 1, why do the death figures differ between sources?
"The Mau Mau war was the main reason Kenya became independent in 1963." How far do you agree?

Show answersHide answers

The best farmland in the central highlands, reserved for Europeans from 1902 to 1961. Many Kikuyu lost land, were crowded into reserves or became squatters, so land became the central grievance.
Jomo Kenyatta.
On 20 October 1952. Kenyatta was arrested with about 180 leaders, convicted in 1953 of leading Mau Mau, imprisoned and released in 1961.
Mau Mau: the attack on loyalists at Lari in March 1953. Colonial forces: detention and torture in camps, executions, or the beating to death of eleven detainees at Hola in 1959.
Guards beat eleven detainees to death. The outcry in Britain helped to persuade the government to end the Emergency and negotiate.
The Emergency ended (January 1960); the Lancaster House conference accepted African majority rule (1960); Kenyatta was released (1961); KANU won the elections (May 1963); self-government (1 June 1963); independence (12 December 1963).
Records were incomplete; some deaths were never recorded; the colonial government's official figures may have been too low, so historians such as David Anderson give higher estimates.
Agree in part: the war made Kenya costly and embarrassing to hold, and Hola turned British opinion. But Mau Mau was defeated militarily by 1956; independence came through negotiation, the pressure of nationalist parties, Britain's wider retreat from empire after 1960 and the example of other African states. The war was an important cause, not the only one.

1An apology of sorts, fifty years later

2Why Kenya's road was violent

3The process, step by step

4The human cost

5Discuss

An apology of sorts, fifty years later

Why Kenya's road was violent

The process, step by step

The human cost

Discuss