October 31, 1931 - February 18, 1957
PRESS CONFERENCE AT KIMATHI MONUMENT
DEDAN KIMATHI wa WACIURI: REMEMBERING KENYA’S GREATS
Today, 60 years ago a great Kenyan and Statesman was assassinated in cold blood by the British
imperialists. His only offence? Fighting and defending his country and motherland. He was
charged with belonging to a proscribed movement, The Mau Mau movement, whose objective
was to push out British colonialists and their collaborators who had brutally evicted communities
from their lands, imposed taxation, forced them to labor, prevented them from growing cashcrops,
raped their wives and daughters, introduced segregation, imprisoned their fathers and
sons, and banned their association, expression, worship and philosophy. They also created
classism and schism to weaken and rule with ease and hence cultivating general despondency.
60 years later, the British rulers are not gone, they have rebranded. They were white foreigners,
they are black elite, they were collaborators; they are neocolonialists and co-conspirators. The
gap between the rich and the poor is the second widest in the world. Peasant farmers and factory
laborers cannot educate their children, our land is still in the hands of the mighty few. Kenyans
are the most taxed citizens in the world. Besides direct murder, rape and imprisonment of
daughters and sons of this country, growing prostitution is a sign that rape has taken a
commercial form pushed by extreme poverty and want for basic needs on one hand and petty
criminals pushed out of school and unemployment leading to alcoholism and drug addiction on
the other hand. The economy is not only in the hands of a few rich but who also determine the
fate of every single Kenyan through unpopular policies that have made Kenyans take economic
refuge outside their country. Freedom of expression and movement is limited to cheap welfarism
that cannot go beyond burials and weddings. Kenyans are more divided than ever before and
instead of asking why they are the way they are, they turn their anger on each other to the benefit
of the elite who remain united in greed despite their race, gender, ethnic, political or religious
affiliations. Innocent Kenyans are hunted like antelopes within and outside the country; their
only offence was to be their brothers’ and sisters’ keepers, witnessing human rights violations,
questioning corruption, asking why the cost of living is high and why the rule of law is not
followed and impunity is the order of the day.
60 years today, we stand here at his monument to announce the commemoration of the first
Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces and Prime Minister of Kenya. The brave gallant son
of Africa, Pan-Africanist who confronted the mighty British forces, his bare hands against
sophisticated arsenal, his vision for self-rule overcame the callous propaganda of the white
minority and their collaborators. He could not stand a minute of British rule that had cheated him
and others that Kenya would be free after supporting it in the 2nd World War.
60 years today, generations later, very few Kenyans remember not only this son of Africa but
also what he stood and died for. So here we are, inviting all Kenyans to join us on 18th February
2014 at Freedom Corner to start the processions through Kenyatta Avenue, Kimathi Street to this
monument to pay our honour with a wreath of flowers since no one knows where his body is
laid. Then the procession will head to the Jeevanjee Garden that was founded by a great
industrialist and also freedom fighter Alibhai Mulla Jevanjee, for speeches and exhibition taking
the rest of the day. At 6.00 pm we will all move to the National Theatre where Prof. Maina wa
Kinyatti, another liberation intellectual will launch his latest book, MWAKENYA – The Unfinished
Revolution.(http://youtu.be/HBJyL-5g2WI)
This Kimathi monument did not come easy. It was fought for so that it could immortalize the
struggle, remind Kenyans that unlike in most other countries, independence did not come easy
and to remember what the struggle was about, use this and similar days as a yardstick to assess
whether there is progress or not, for, as the late Jaramogi Oginga Odinga wrote in his book Not
Yet Uhuru, we are not there yet.
“A people cannot know where they are going without knowing where they are coming from,” so
said the late Bob Marley. A society that does not remember or honour the memory of its heroes
and heroines cannot grow to its potential. There are young and not so young Kenyans who know
little or have never heard of liberation heroes like Me Katilili wa Menza, Koitalel Samoei,
Waiyaki wa Hinga, Field Marshal Baimunge, Masinde Muliro, Muthoni Nyanjiru, Pio Gama
Pinto, Tom Mboya, JM Kariuki, Titus Adungosi, Karimi Nduthu, Oulu GPO and Oscar Kingara
to mention but just a few. There has been deliberate distortion of history with a view to
extinguishing the true contribution to the struggle by these past heroes and heroines, sometimes
reducing them to tribal icons. This and similar commemorations are aimed at correcting these
wrong notions and promoting the true memories by celebrating their lives and documenting the
same for posterity. This initiative is not unique, it is indeed the responsibility of the government,
but the official narrative accompanying these events have been exclusive and boycotted by many
because of the disconnect between what the heroes and heroines stood for and what the
government is practicing.
This event is organized by the Solidarity Committee of the Human Rights Fraternity that brings
together all human rights initiatives in the country - formal and non-formal - that speaks on
behalf of many silent and suppressed voices.
Signed :
Otieno Ombok …………………………………..
Muthoni Kamau …………………………………..
Alamin Kimathi …………………………………..
Humphrey Kimani …………………………………..
Suba Churchill …………………………………..
Mungai Mbuthi …………………………………..
Khamis Ramadhan …………………………………..
Vincent Kidaha …………………………………..
Cidi Otieno …………………………………..
Gacheke Gachihi …………………………………..
