Mau Mau Movement

“Mau Mau” is a controversial concept, but it is one that is important for understanding Kenya's past and continuing struggles for social justice. It is used by historians sympathetic to the liberation cause to refer to the heroic anti-colonial guerilla movement comprising the Land Freedom Army (LFA) and their civilian supporters that culminated into a bitter military engagement between 1952 and 1956. Colonial historiography, in contrast, portrays Mau Mau as one of the most savage and barbaric insurgencies of the 20th century. British colonialists and their African loyalists often referred to the Mau Mau as a mental illness that turned Africans, especially the Kikuyu, to savagery, bestiality, atavism, oathing, cannibalism, murder, and sexual perversion. This colonial meaning does not acknowledge the social, economic, political, and cultural grievances that gave birth to and fueled the insurgency.

The seeds of Mau Mau can be traced to the colonial government's land alienation policies that supported the white settler economy. Land alienation intensified after World War I, when the need arose to resettle demobilized British soldiers and white immigrants from South Africa. The process was supported by a series of land ordinances that allowed nearly unrestricted acquisition of land by the settlers while further restricting the use of land by Africans. As their traditional land turned into white enclaves through regulations and coercion, landless Africans either became squatters or moved to the sprouting urban centers, especially Nairobi, to seek employment. This African movement was highly regulated through the introduction of the Kipande, the identity card that would lead to a fine, imprisonment, or both if it was not produced on demand. Land alienation, the Kipande, taxation, police brutality, and extreme poverty all contributed to growing disillusionment among the African population.

Ethnic and national political organizations of diverse ideologies began to agitate for the rights of the African as early as the 1920s, most prominently among the Kikuyu. Some of those formed between 1919 and 1950 were the Kikuyu Association (KA), East African Association (EAA), Kikuyu Central Association (KCA), Kenya African Union (KAU), and the East African Trade Union Congress. In spite of the political activity generated by these organizations, organized resistance to the colonial rule suffered from a lack of a consolidated leadership and coherent goals. More significant was the fact that rural peasants and the landless did not feel their interests were well represented by the more educated Africans leaders of these organizations. The more radical elements within the organizations, popular among peasants, advocated violent means of agitating against the British colonial policies. They also welcomed the use of oathing to ensure unity, which intensified after the government banned the Mau Mau in 1950, spreading widely in the Central Province and the Rift Valley. Furthermore, aggressive types of oaths were now overriding the earlier, more conservative Oath of Unity. The Batuni oath or warrior oath, for instance, had become widespread by 1952 and was being administered in readiness for the anticipated military showdown with the colonial forces. It is this more radical wing of the anti-colonial struggle that came to be associated with the Mau Mau.

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