Nairobi, Kenya
December 12, 2012
This week Kenya celebrated
its 49th Uhuru Birthday. However, Kenyan history is
being distorted before our very eyes. Those born after Uhuru may never know the
difference between Uhuru Day and Jamhuri Day.
This week, Kenya
celebrated 49 years since we attained independence. It was Uhuru that was
attained on December 12 1963 not Jamhuri.
A year later on the same day, the
nation became a republic under Jomo Kenyatta. It is therefore correct to say that
it is 48 years since Kenya became a republic.
To tell you the truth,
Uhuru Day was more historic and euphoric than Jamhuri a year later. On that day
of December 12 1963, the British flag was lowered as the Kenyan flag climbed
Mt. Kenya.
As little kids in early
primary schools, we didn’t know much about what Uhuru was in our villages but
we knew something big was about to happen in Kenya. However, because of the
hype by the then freedom fighters who we had only heard of, news filtered that
independence was coming very soon and it was being brought from England in a
big aeroplane by Jomo Kenyatta, Tom Mboya and Jaramogi Oginga Odinga. That was
all we knew even though none of us had ever seen them.
Village Uhuru heroes were
very good at giving us heroic deeds of
Jaramogi, Oneko, Mboya, Kenyatta and Masinde Muliro, confusing the latter with
another Masinde the sect leader at the time.
We were told countless
times how Mboya, Kenyatta and Jaramogi, through their magical powers had cheated
death planned for them by the colonial masters and their collaborators in Kenya
and abroad. To us therefore, these three musketeers were invincible supermen
that no human power could destroy- not even the Mzungu’s smoking gun.
In our little villages,
our small minds were fed with Uhuru fantasies.
With the fall of White
power, all the big jobs, houses, cars and trains would belong to us.
We were told by our
village heroes that all the good things in life, milk, honey and all would flow
in to the village and that all those beautiful mission houses belonging to
White missionaries would be given to us for free.
There would after Uhuru be
free education, medical care and that all forms of transport would be free.
This free access to everything our hearts desired was in tandem with the
impending freedom- freedom to acquire.
What our heroes never told
us was that the fruits of Uhuru we were anticipating would only come through
sheer hard work. We were to learn the hard way years later when Jomo Kenyatta
started talking of Uhuru na kazi- that nothing was going to be for free.
In my little mind I took
literary what my village activists had promised me.
And so, on the morning of
December 12 1963, I walked away from home to our local market three miles away.
From there I proceeded to the bus stop and got into one of the big buses plying
Nairobi Kisumu route. Indeed I was given a free ride to Kisumu 42km away from
home. When I got to the town, hell broke loose.
The multitude that greeted
me at the bus stop caught me bewildered. I was literally lost in this sea of
humanity. What was worse; I had no money and did not know how to get back to
Awasi.
It then occurred to me
that one of my teachers, Mr. Solomon Ageng’o had joined East African Railways
and Harbours and was the Station Master at Lela near Maseno. However, how to
get to the Kisumu Railway station was another issue since I was in Kisumu for
the first time alone in my life.
After several attempts I
finally got to the Railway Station and reported my plight to the Station Master
who promptly radioed my teacher. However, by that time, the Kisumu Butere line
was long gone. The next train would depart at 6am. I had to spend the first chilly
Uhuru night at the railway station.
Soon after independence,
we started seeing symbols of freedom for our peasant village elders. Poll taxes
were abolished. Forced labour especially in the Chief’s camps was abolished.
Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, an anti-colonialist had long held the view that Chiefs, Sub Chiefs and Headmen had no role in
modern Kenya as they had been used by the colonial government to suppress and
oppress peasants.
To effect his policy
shift, as Home Affairs Minister, he forced chiefs to be elected by the
villagers.
It is funny that what our
new constitution is trying to give us 49 years later we had from the beginning.
The 1963 Uhuru ushered in a central government under the Prime Minister and
less than 20 ministers and their permanent secretaries.
The same Lancaster
Constitution gave us the Senate and eight regional governments complete with
their governors and regional assemblies. This dream government that was forced
on Kenyans by the then opposition KADU was the ideal arrangement that should
have ensured equity from day one.
However, due to blind euphoria
and faith in our founding fathers, we let our hard won Uhuru die on its first
birthday. In its place came Jamhuri with absolute authority of the president.
Overnight, the opposition KADU, the Senate was gone, regional assemblies were
abolished and the Prime Minister became the President without any reference to
Kenyans.
This situation was not
unique to Kenya. It was the same story in Tanzania, Uganda, Ghana, Nigeria and
most British former colonies at the time.
For Kenya, the 49 long
years were punctuated by loss of freedom, political assassinations, rampant
official looting of public resources and a mini civil war.
For our troubles, we got a
new constitution.
Would things have worked
out differently had we remained a British dominion for a while just like Canada,
New Zealand and Australia had done before us?
We will never know
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