DOCUMENT A

SOURCE: Speech made by at the Meeting in Nyeri, Kenya on July 26, 1952.

NOTE: Jomo Kenyatta (1893-1978) served as the first Prime Minister (1963–1964) and President (1964–1978) of Kenya. He is considered the founding father of the Kenyan nation.

... I want you to know the purpose of the . It is the biggest purpose

the African has. It involves every African in Kenya and it is their mouthpiece (messenger) which asks for freedom. Kenya African Union is you and you are the Kenya Africa Union. If we unite now, each and every one of us, and each tribe to another, we will cause the implementation (achievement) in this country of what the European calls democracy.

True democracy has no colour distinction (difference). It does not choose between black and white. We are here in this tremendous gathering under the Kenya African Union flag to find which road leads us from darkness into democracy. In order to find it we Africans must first achieve the right to elect our own representatives. That is

surely the first principle of democracy. We are the only race in Kenya which does not elect its own representatives in the Legislature and we are going to set about to rectify (fix) this situation. We feel we are dominated by a handful of others who refuse to be

just.

God said this is our land . . . . We want our cattle to get fat on our land so that our children grow up in prosperity (wealth); we do not want that fat removed to feed others . . . . We want to prosper as a nation, and as a nation we demand equality, that

is equal pay for equal work. Whether it is a chief, headman, or laborer he needs increased salary. He needs a salary that compares with a salary of a European who does equal work. We will never get our freedom unless we succeed in this issue. We do not want equal pay for equal work tomorrow - we want it right now . . . . If we work together as one, we must succeed.

DOCUMENT B

SOURCE: History of the Pan-African Congress: Colonial and Coloured Unity, a Programme of Action. Edited by , , England.

The Challenge to Colonial Powers

The delegates to the Fifth Pan-African Congress believe in peace. How could it be otherwise when for centuries the African people have been the victims of violence and slavery? Yet if the is still determined to rule mankind by force, then Africans, as a last resort, may have to appeal to (use) force in the effort to achieve freedom . . .

We are determined to be free. We want education. We want the right to earn a decent living, the right to express our thoughts and emotions, to adopt and create forms of beauty. We demand for Black Africa autonomy (self-rule) and independence . . . We are not ashamed to have been an age-long patient people. We continue willingly to sacrifice and strive. But we are unwilling to starve any longer while doing the world’s drudgery (hard work) in order to support by our poverty and ignorance false aristocracy (upper class) and discarded imperialism.

Therefore, we shall complain, demand, and accuse. We will make the world listen to the facts of our condition. We will fight in every way we can for freedom,

democracy, and social betterment.

NOTE: The Pan-African Congress was a series of seven meetings that were intended to address the issues facing Africa as a result of European colonization of most of the continent. This excerpt comes from the Fifth Pan-African Congress held in 1945 in , northwest England. There were ninety delegates, twenty six from all over Africa. These included a number of men who would later become political leaders in their newly independent African countries, such as Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya. There were also people like radical George Padmore, a journalist and author, from Trinidad, an island in the Caribbean that later received its independence from Great Britain in 1962.

Despite the turnout, this conference scarcely got a mention in the British press. There were many resolutions passed, including one calling for racial discrimination to be made a criminal offense. The main resolution criticized imperialism and .