Heritage

100 years since IDs advent, tribal issue refuses to go away

mau mau

A colonial village. file photo | nmg

I am glad to report that I have left hospital and now recuperating at home, but restricted to a wheel chair. The nurses and doctors at Nairobi Hospital remarked that I was “a most co-operative patient”. I guess I have not lost my charm after all, even in these difficult circumstances.

Returning from a dressing session at the hospital last week, I decided to pay a visit at Lan’gata Police Station to record my statement concerning my accident one month earlier.

I was very well received and the traffic policeman on duty, seeing my condition, magnanimously offered to record my statement from the car I was sitting in.

After recording my name and address, the policeman proceeded to ask me where I lived and I told him Hardy, Karen. He then asked about my home district, location, sub-location and who my chief was in Kibichoi. Fortunately, my ID card contained all these details, but of course I had no idea who the chief was. These questions are designed to establish one’s tribe.

I was in the company of my eldest daughter, Nashipae Njeri, and the details of her home district, location and sub-location were exactly the same as mine on her ID and by extension my father’s.

When applying for an ID you are required to produce a copy of your father’s ID. I am married to Joyce, a Maasai from Narok. Nashipae was actually born in Narok and she has never lived in Kibichoi yet her ID card defines her as a Kikuyu.

It is astonishing to note that after more than 100 years since the Kipande was designed in 1914 to control the movement and employment of Africans in Kenya, our government is still obsessed with the tribe as part of our biodata, even at the risk of mislabelling many.

A tribe is a group of distinct people who are dependent on their land for their livelihood and are largely self-sufficient; not integrated into the national society.

However, during the period of colonialism “tribe” was also used in a derogatory way to refer to the “barbarian” and primitive ancestors of the Europeans, connecting the Africans to a lower and less developed state of humanity.

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Studies of pre-colonial Kenya show that although these tribes did exist, the boundaries were loosely defined and tribes interacted with each other socially and in trade.

Often members of different tribes would intermarry, further broadening the level of interaction. Although there were sporadic invasions for resources following drought, famine and disease, the tribes did not hate each other.

Sir Fredrick Lugard (1858-1945), the renown British colonial administrator, was a great proponent of the policy of indirect rule in African colonies. He was inspired by the Buganda system which was divided into king-centred, hierarchical societies. According to Lugard, indirect rule was “the high ideal of leading the backward races, by their own efforts, in their own way, to raise themselves to a higher plane of social organisation”.

In its simplest form, indirect rule was a hierarchical pyramid with the governor on top and minor administrators below him. The local chiefs provided, as it were, the last mile connectivity with the natives.

Lugard saw the local chiefs and headmen as the mediators of western civilization and the intercessors of the benefits of forestation, healthcare and agriculture. However, these local chiefs were not independent and were often selected from groups already hand-picked by the local colonial administrators.

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Indirect rule as popularised by Lugard also provided a wonderful opportunity to divide and rule the territory by keeping the tribes separate.

In the European-owned farms African labourers were accommodated according to tribes in the labour camps. Every African was required to carry the dreaded Kipande which contained the details of his home district, local chief and employment records.

Tribes were socialised to be suspicious of each other and narratives were created around each tribe.

With the benefit of hindsight, not much has changed and my recent experience seems to suggest that tribe is still a major consideration in official circles.

We are still coming out of a General Elections and the ugly side of tribalism is showing its head again. As usual the Western media sent hordes of journalists to Kenya to cover the spectacle of primitive tribes slaughtering each other. This time they may have been a little disappointed.

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Returning to the subject of recording statements with the police, should it not be sufficient and more relevant to simply provide details of your present residence rather than constantly reminding us of that colonial legacy of home district?

Surely in today’s highly advanced technological world there are better ways of establishing one’s bona fides.