Heritage

War monument a reminder of our painful history and gift to posterity

askari

The ‘Askari Monument’ on Kenyatta Avenue, Nairobi. The monument was set up on site in 1928 in honour of the Kings African Rifles and Carrier Corps who served in World War 1. SALATON NJAU

This is to the memory of the native African troops who fought; to the carriers who were the hands and feet of the army and to all other men who served and died for their king and country in Eastern Africa in the Great War, 1914-1918. If you fight for your country, even if you die, your sons will remember your name.”

These words are inscribed on the “Askari Monument” standing on Kenyatta Avenue facing Bank of India. On the right hand side of the monument is an insignia with the words “Myrander SC, 1924”, indicating the pseudonym of the designer, British sculptor, James Alexander Stevenson and the year the monument was made.

The monument was erected on site in 1928 in honour of the Kings African Rifles and Carrier Corps who served in World War 1. The three African men represent a porter, an askari (a fighting man) and a gun carrier.

Interestingly, the men are not identified by name or rank as is often the case with statues. Perhaps this would have elevated them to the giddy heights of heroes, which was not the intention.

Was this just a paternalistic gesture to ease the guilt of the colonial masters and mollify the African?

There are similar statues which were erected at the same time in Mombasa and Dar-es-Salaam. The British were lured into a senseless sideshow in East Africa by the Germans who hoped to distract resources from the main war arena in Europe.

Dubbed the East African Campaign, the British relied heavily on poorly trained and equipped African soldiers (askaris) and porters (of the Carrier Corps) to provide ground cover and support under treacherous conditions.

Africans were enlisted by force into service and in the course of the war more than 30,000 askaris and 400,000 porters were recruited. For some of the Africans, this provided an opportunity to escape the punitive colonial hut and poll taxes and to earn some decent money.

Once recruited, the Africans were given a few days to bid farewell to their loved ones, making it clear that they were very likely never to return.

By the end of the war close to 50,000 Africans had lost their lives through combat, disease or just disappeared in a cause they did not understand.

Derogatory reference

The term “askari” is an Indian name which loosely translated means “soldiers”. However, the name was used by colonial powers to describe the armed escort a traveller uses to accompany him into East Africa comprising free black men, natives of Zanzibar, or freed slaves from the interior.

They were armed and equipped like soldiers but they would engage themselves also as servants. To be honest the name was a derogatory reference to an African soldier.

After the end of the war, British soldiers were decorated and rewarded generously with the government setting up a Soldier Settlement Scheme which provided favourable terms for settlement in Kenya and elsewhere.

In contrast, only long serving askaris had small pensions set aside, benefited in preferential hiring in the colonial service, and sometimes even small land grants to aid in their retirement.

The majority of returning askaris had no such benefits and in fact found that they were subject to the newly introduced and oppressive “kipande” rules under which their only option was to seek indentured labour in settler enterprises.

All was not lost however, as these same askaris had come into contact with the outside world in the course of the war and they had seen that the white man was not infallible.

They saw white men die in their hands and so the myth was broken. This was the seed that was to grow into a nationalist movement in the 1920s. The rest, as they say, is history.

In 1984, Njenga Mungai, then Assistant Minister for Local Government, revealed in Parliament that the government planned to remove the monument and replace it with one of Dedan Kimathi.

Heated debate

A heated debate ensued with many MPs suggesting that it should be uprooted and stored in the National Museum. It was President Daniel Moi who saved the day by ordering that the monument should be left in-situ and another site be allocated for Dedan Kimathi.

Last March, a protest movement known as Rhodes Must Fall was started with the sole purpose of removing the statue of Cecil Rhodes from the University of Cape Town.

The movement attracted global attention leading to a wider protest to “decolonise” education in South Africa. The statue was removed a month later.

The ongoing destruction of historical sites by ISIS in the Middle East is a different matter and can only be described as theft to finance their hegemonistic intentions.

Does the destruction or removal of a monument erase the history it represents? The answer is clearly “no”. Our history is indelibly written in time and we cannot simply wipe it out.

However, we must not allow ourselves to be held hostage by our history. We need to preserve our monuments as constant reminders of those parts of our history to which we must say “never again” no matter how painful the memories and, in equal measure those parts which we consider to be good for posterity.

A nation which does not cherish its history cannot successfully chart its future.