Komo Kenyatta Essay Research Paper KENYATTA

Komo Kenyatta Essay, Research Paper

KENYATTA ….. Taa ya Kenya or Swahili for the ‘Light of Kenya’ was the

man who brought the light of independence to Kenya. Indeed, he was a

beacon, a rallying point for suffering Kenyans to fight for their rights,

justice and freedom.

His brilliance gave strength and aspiration to people beyond the

boundaries of Kenya, indeed beyond the shores of Africa. Just as one light

shines in total darkness and provides a raliying point, so did Ken-yatta

become the focus of the freedom fight for Kenya over half a century to

dispell the darkness and injustice of colonialism. Before matter can

become light, it has to suffer the rigours of heat. So did Kenyatta

suffer the rigorous of imprisonment to bring independence to Kenya. As the

founding father of Kenya, and its undisputed leader, he came to be known

as Mzee, Swahili for a respected eider.

No chronology can adequately reflect the many sided achievements of

Mzee Kenyatta. His life is the life of the free Kenya nation chronicled

here.

There is Kenyatta the leader who united all races and tribes for the

freedom struggle; Kenyatta the orator who held his listeners entranced,

Kenyatta the journalist who launched the first indigenous paper to voice

his people’s demands; Kenyatta the scholar who wrote the first serious

study about his people; Kenyatta the teacher who initiated love for

Kenyah culture and heritage; Kenyatta the farmer who loved his land and

urged his people to return to it; Kenyatta the biographer who documented

his ’suffering without bitterness’; Kenyatta the conser-vationist who

protected Kenya’s priceless fauna and flora; Kenyatta the father figure

who showered love and affection on all; Kenyatta the democrat who

upheld the democratic principle of one-man one-vote; Kenyatta the eider

statesman who counselled other Heads of State, and finally Kenyatta the

visionary who had a glorious image of Kenya’s future and toiled to realise

it.

Since ideas are more enduring than human bodies and sacrifices last

longer than sermons thus the light that is Kenyatta burns on to illuminate

the path of Kenya.

Kenyatta, Jomo (1897.-1978), first prime minister (1963-1964) and then

first president (1964-1978) of Kenya. Kenyatta was Kenya’s founding

father, a conservative nationalist who led the East African nation to

independence from Britain in 1963.

Kenyatta was born in Gatundu in the part of British East Africa that is

now Kenya; the year of his birth is uncertain, but most scholars agree

he was born in the 1890s. He was born into the Kikuyu ethnic group,

Kenya’s largest. Named Kamau wa Ngengi at birth, he later adopted the

surname Kenyatta (from the Kikuyu word for a type of beaded belt he wore)

and then the first name Jomo. Kenyatta was educated by Presbyterian

missionaries and by 1921 had moved to the city of Nairobi. There he became

involved in early African protest movements, joining the Kikuyu Central

Association (KCA) in 1924. He quickly emerged as a leader within the

KCA, and in 1928 he became editor of the movement’s newspaper. In 1929

and 1931 Kenyatta visited England to present KCA demands for the return

of African land lost to European settlers and for increased political

and economic opportunity for Africans in Kenya, which had become a colony

within British East Africa in 1920. Kenyatta had little success,

however.

Kenyatta remained in Europe for almost 15 years, during which he

attended various schools and universities, traveled extensively, and

published numerous articles and pamphlets on Kenya and the plight of Kenyans

under colonial rule. While attending the London School of Economics,

Kenyatta studied under noted British anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski

and published his seminal work, Facing Mount Kenya (1938). In this book,

Kenyatta described traditional Kikuyu society as well-ordered and

harmonious and criticized the disruptive changes brought by colonialism.

Facing Mount Kenya was well received in Great Britain as a defense of

African culture, and it established Kenyatta’s credentials as spokesperson

for his people.

Following World War II (1939-1945), Kenyatta became an outspoken

nationalist, demanding Kenyan self-government and independence from Great

Britain. Together with other prominent African nationalist figures, such

as Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, Kenyatta helped organize the fifth

Pan-African Congress in Great Britain in 1945. The congress, modeled after the

four congresses organized by black American intellectual W. E. B. Du Bois

between 1919 and 1927 and attended by black leaders and intellectuals

from around the world, affirmed the goals of African nationalism and

unity. In September 1946 Kenyatta returned to Kenya, and in June 1947 he

became president of the first colony-wide

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