Kenya lifts ban on Mau Mau ...

The Kenyan Government has decided to legalise the Mau Mau, the movement that fought colonial rule, over 50 years after it was banned by the British authorities.

The decision, announced by Kenya's minister of national security, will allow former Mau Mau fighters to register as a society and end the stigma that has hung over the movement, even after independence in 1963.

President Jomo Kenyatta was jailed for his alleged links with the group
Mau Mau - or the Land and Freedom Army, as they called themselves - have waited a very long time to receive recognition.

Their attacks on white settlers threw colonial society into panic and Britain imposed a state of emergency in 1952.













Yet despite their obvious role in fighting for independence, no Kenyan Government has previously been prepared to lift the ban.

This is because the Mau Mau rebellion was, at least in part, a civil war.

'Bury the past'

Kenya's first President, Jomo Kenyatta, was a strong nationalist, but he was not a member of Mau Mau, despite being convicted of belonging to the movement in what historians regard as a rigged, show trial.

Once independence came, Kenyatta's government included more people who had fought against Mau Mau than had participated in the rebellion.

"When he came to power in 1963, Kenyatta tried very hard to bury the past, to put Mau Mau behind him," says David Anderson of St Anthony's College, Oxford.

"He told Kenyans that they should forget it, that the quickest way to curing the evils of that period was to forget it. And so in public life, it became almost impossible to mention Mau Mau, never mind to memorialise it."

The conflict took a terrible toll: Mau Mau lost around 20,000 men.

They killed some 4,000 people - including 32 white settlers.

The movement administered oaths and inflicted death on anyone who betrayed them. More than 1,000 were hanged, including their leader, Dedan Kimathi, whose body still lies in a Nairobi prison. ~ By Martin Plaut

Kenya wants UK "Atrocity" apology

British soldiers are accused of rape, torture and killing
Kenya has demanded an apology from the UK for alleged atrocities committed against Mau Mau fighters seeking independence in the 1950s.
Justice Minister Kiraitu Murungi said it was the honourable thing to do to formally apologise for "barbaric crimes against humanity".

War veterans are preparing to sue Britain for compensation, claiming they were tortured in detention.

Official estimates say 11,000 Mau Mau were killed by British forces.

The minister made the comments at the launch of the book Caroline Elkins' Britain's Gulag: The Brutal End of Empire, which details the crackdown of the rebellion and the Kikuyu community.

Ms Elkins, who is a professor at Harvard University, disputes the official death toll saying many more died in the conflict.

"I now believe there was in late colonial Kenya a murderous campaign to eliminate Kikuyu people that left tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands dead," she writes in the book.

Corruption

"I call upon the government of the United Kingdom, as a civilised nation to do the honourable thing and issue a formal apology to the Mau Mau, their families and the people of Kenya for these barbaric crimes against humanity," Mr Murungi said.

British servicemen who suffered atrocities at the hands of the Japanese during the Second World War were compensated, he said.

It's only that way that we can say that our humanity is recognised

Lawyer Paul Muite
"We do not believe it would be too much to ask the UK government to extend the same principle to the Mau Mau war veterans and their families."

A spokesman from the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office said the UK government understood the issue still created strong feelings in Kenya and that the hardships during the emergency had caused pain on both sides and marred the progress towards independence.

"But this took place 50 years ago. Kenya needs to look to future challenges like fighting corruption, fighting injustice and building a strong democracy," he told the BBC News website.

Relations between the UK and Kenya have recently been strained after the UK High Commission to Nairobi accused the Kenyan government of massive corruption.

Doing wrong

Vice President Moody Awori, also at the function, said the British campaign was "cruel and pitiless".

"The fact that colonialists put so much effort to conceal their actions means they knew what they were doing was wrong," he said.

The allegations in the book include rape, torture, murder and theft of property.

"We want the British government to acknowledge their wrongdoing and say sorry," Paul Muite, one of a group of lawyers preparing to sue Britain for compensation on behalf of former Mau Mau fighters, told AFP news agency.

"It's only that way that we can say that our humanity is recognised."