The Nyeri county government has pledged to partner with the National Museums to develop three historic Mau Mau sites located in county.
The sites include the Nyeri Museum which is homes to relics from the Kikuyu community’s colonial era. The county government will also partner with the museum to develop the Mau Mau flag site, where freedom fighters assembled twice on July 6,1952 to declare war against the colonial administration and its loyalists and on December 19,1963 assembled again on the same site to surrender their arms as sign of the end of the uprising.
Speaking when he hosted Mau Mau veterans, national government and county government officials to a breakfast at the Museum, Nyeri governor, Mutahi Kahiga said that there is also a proposal to build a Mau Mau Museum in Karuna-ini in Tetu constituency, which is the spot where Field Marshal Dedan Kimathi was shot and captured on October 21, 1956 by the British soldiers.
“We, as the county government are ready to work with the National government to improve the status of these sites,” said Kahiga.
“I have spoken with the president and appealed to him to give us a 99 or 100 years lease for a 10-acre piece of land in Karuna-ini where Dedan Kimathi was shot. Our plan is to build a museum where we can preserve Mau Mau artefacts,” he added.
In his address to the freedom fighters, the county boss also assured them that he will continue to pursue their compensation.
He noted that whereas the British government had compensated a few of the Mau Mau torture victims, a majority of the freedom fighters were yet to receive any form of justice for the atrocities faced during the freedom struggle.
While expressing his optimism with the current administration in addressing the emotive land issue for the freedom fighters, Kahiga noted that for the first time, the country’s administration was in the hands of descendants of freedom fighters.
“The freedom struggle was aimed at securing the country’s independence and recovering our land from the colonialist. Whereas the county gained independence, freedom fighters never recovered the land. Even with the previous administrations, we have not been able to move these people from the over 228 colonial villages,” he stated.
“I want to tell all the Mau Mau heroes that if we do not get their pleas heard by this administration, we will never get sorted. For the first time this country is being steered by sons of Mau Mau and we will continue to remind them that freedom fighters are yet to attain whatever they were fighting for,” added Kahiga.
