What became of the Kapenguria six?
By STEPHEN MBURU
Only half of the Kapenguria Six are alive today. Apart from Mr Achieng' Oneko, Mr Paul Ngei and Mr Bildad Kaggia are wallowing in abject poverty. Their former comrades in arms Jomo Kenyatta and Fred Kubai and have died while Kung'u Karumba disappeared during a business trip to Uganda.
Kaggia is seriously sick at his Kandara home in Murang'a while Ngei depends on well-wishers to provide him with shelter after auctioneers evicted him from his city home.
The Kapenguria Six were arrested on October 20, 1952 in the wake of Mau Mau uprising. They were charged with trying to overthrow the colonial government through the Mau Mau movement.
The six were tried at Kapenguria and detained for seven years. Thus the name Kapenguria Six.
After detention and following Kenya's independence on December 12, 1963, Kenyatta became the President while the rest save for Karumba, became members of the new Parliament.
Oneko and Ngei were Cabinet ministers while Kaggia and Kubai were assistants.
Kaggia was Kandara MP and Assistant Minister for Education in 1963 before he fell out with Kenyatta over the land tenure system.
He advocated the compensation of former Mau Mau fighters. He wanted the government to give Uhuru heroes free land but Kenyatta was opposed to the idea. The President was for willing-seller-willing-buyer policy.
Kaggia was sacked in 1964 and lost interest in politics.
Ngei, once a robust politician, has almost been reduced to a beggar. He moves around in a wheelchair after his legs were amputated to save his life following diabetic complications. The right leg was amputated in 1997 and the other last year.
The former minister in both the Kenyatta and Moi governments, variously described as a "man of many lives like a cat', was evicted by auctioneers from his mansion at Garden Estate over an Sh19 million debt.
Once a rich man, Ngei, 77, had in 1990 been declared bankrupt and barred from holding public office.
In 1966, Kenyatta suspended Ngei as minister to pave the way for a commission of inquiry into the affairs of the Minister following an alleged maize scandal.
In 1974, he lost his Kangundo Parliamentary seat after a petition court found him guilty of election offences but Kenyatta had the Constitution changed to give his former comrade-in-arms a chance to run again.
Once a politician always one, Ngei is a common face in the corridors of Parliament Buildings. But few politicians have time for the ex-freedom fighter. Many just greet the hero and walk away.
Ngei was a founder of Kenya African Union (KAU), Kanu's fore-runner. KAU, whose President was James Gichuru. Ngei was the Mackakos branch secretary. He also founder the Africa People's Party in 1962.
Ngei was in the Moi Cabinet until 1988 when he lost his Kangundo Parliamentary seat to Maj (Rtd) Jackson Mulinge.
Kubai was a freedom fighter since his youth. But he died a poor man at the age of 79. Kubai had worked closely with Kenyatta and the Kikuyu Central Association. He was the first chairman of one of the few trade unions established to fight for the rights of African workers Ð the Transport and Allied Workers Union (Tawi) in 1949. After independence in 1963, Kubai became Nakuru East MP and appointed an assistant Minister for Labour in the Kenyatta government.
He lost the seat in the 1974 but recaptured the seat in 1983. He retired from active politics in 1988. Though he had been decorated by Kenyatta with the Order of the Burning Spear (OBS) First Class in 1967 and by President Moi, with the Elder of the Burning Spear (EBS), Kubai lived a solitary life confined to a wheelchair at his Ngeya Farm in Nakuru. Like Ngei, he had his right leg amputated in January 1991. He died in June1996 at a time a stroke he had suffered cost him his speech. He could only communicate through sign language.
Apart from his coffin being draped with the party flag, the government was not represented. Mr Oneko attended the burial of his detention mate.
On release from detention, Karumbaopted to do business and shied off politics.
He was in public transport business but disappeared mysteriously in Uganda at the height of political tension following the murder of Nyandarua North MP J.M. Kariuki in 1975.
His disappearance is yet to be unravelled 25 years down the line.
At the time of his arrest in 1952, Onekowas KAU secretary general.
He was editor of Ramogi, a political monthly publication in the Luo language, that used to campaign for KAU.
Upon independence, he became Minister for Information.
Kenyatta detained him from 1969 to 1975. He and other leaders of the Opposition Kenyan People's Union (KPU) of former Vice-President Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, were accused of causing riots during Kenyatta's tour of Kisumu town. Kenyatta had gone there to open Nyanza Provincial Hospital.
Scores of people were killed during the skirmishes.
Oneko, Kenyatta's former personal secretary, was the only one of the Kapenguria Six to have suffered detention after independence.
The politician romped back to Parliament in 1992 following the re-introduction of multi party system. He was Rarienda MP on a Ford Kenya ticket until 1997 when he lost.
Oneko, 78, spends a quiet life either in Nairobi or at his rural farm in Uyoma, Rarienda.
Kenyatta, was undoubtedly the luckiest of the Kapenguria Six.
He used to say Uhuru na Kazi, meaning there were no free things. That Kenyans, including former freedom fighters, had to toil to own property.
Critics accused him of favouring former colonial homeguards and their offsprings.
They were unhappy his government seemed to have neglected the former freedom fighters and that most top civil service jobs went to those whose parents collaborated with the colonial masters.
