KENYA: Mau Mau war veterans celebrate a ruling by a British Court that allows them to pursue a claim for compensation of colonial-era abuses against the British government

Record ID: 362379

  • Title: KENYA: Mau Mau war veterans celebrate a ruling by a British Court that allows them to pursue a claim for compensation of colonial-era abuses against the British government
  • Date: 6th October 2012
  • Summary: NAIROBI, KENYA (OCTOBER 5, 2012) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF VETERANS CELEBRATING TWO VETERANS SHOUTING "PRAISE GOD" MAU MAU WAR VETERANS SECRETARY GENERAL GITU WA KAHENGERI, CELEBRATING WITH OTHER VETERANS VETERANS EMBRACING (SOUNDBITE) (English) MAU MAU WAR VETERANS SECRETARY GENERAL GITU WA KAHENGERI, SAYING: "It's a great day for the Mau Mau war veterans association, hero
  • Embargoed: 21st October 2012 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Kenya
  • Country: Kenya
  • Topics: Legal System,Conflict,History,Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA2ZLOF2F1FAGM46079U0ZKAEMK
  • Story Text: Kenya's Mau Mau war veterans gathered in Nairobi and burst into celebration on Friday (October 5) after receiving news that a British court ruled that three elderly Kenyans who were tortured under British rule in the 1950s could pursue their claim for damages from London.
    The judgement is likely to encourage other claims from victims of colonial-era brutality.
    Britain, which had tried for three years to block their legal action, said it was disappointed and planned to appeal while lawyers for the claimants warned the ruling would be studied carefully by victims of other alleged colonial crimes.
    Now in their 70s and 80s, the claimants suffered castration, rape and beatings while in detention during a ruthless crackdown by British forces and their Kenyan allies on rebels from the Mau Mau movement fighting for land and freedom.
    Mau Mau war veterans Secretary General Gitu Wa Kahengeri expressed his satisfaction.
    "It's a great day for the Mau Mau war veterans association, heroes organisation that took the case to England for compensation, don't forget that the British colonial association did a great deal of atrocities to the people of Kenya, when they administered our country without our consent," he said.
    He added that he wanted Britain to apologise and to fund welfare benefits for Kenyan victims of torture by colonial forces.
    "Now that we have defeated them in this case we want them to pay us compensation and indeed to apologise to the people of Kenya and indeed the people they imprisoned put in the detention for seven years, loosing a generation," Kahengeri said.
    Britain's Foreign Office said it was disappointed and believed the judgement had potentially far-reaching legal implications.
    The case stems from the so-called Kenyan "Emergency" of 1952-1961, during which fighters from the Mau Mau movement attacked British targets, causing panic among white settlers and alarming the authorities in London.
    Tens of thousands of rebels were killed by colonial forces and an estimated 150,000 Kenyans, many of them unconnected to the Mau Mau, were held in detention camps likened by a leading historian of the period to Soviet gulag labour camps.
    The three claimants, all in their 70s and 80s, are Paulo Nzili, Wambugu Wa Nyingi and Jane Muthoni Mara. A fourth claimant, Ndiku Mutwiwa Mutua, has died since the legal action began.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2012. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
Register