Afleveringen

  • Learning about the ways of the Aztec today, we all pretty much agree that their ideas around human sacrifices are barbaric. That they have no place in our “modern” civilizations today.

    But is this really the case?

    In this episode, we explore the ways in which capitalism’s ways of knowing and doing (its epistemologies) perpetuate the same ideas of human sacrifice today. We start with the more direct examples of workers literally dying for profit—the construction workers who die building homes they cannot afford to live, and the many factory workers who die manufacturing products we can use (deaths we have just come to accept as inevitable or as “accidents”). Then, we move to the indirect examples of people lacking food and shelter because these basic needs have come to be understood as commodities those with capital need to make profit from, and not as just things people need to live. In this, we see how capitalism changes what we know to be true; that houses provide shelter (instead we think of houses as investments we are supposed to make profit from), that forests have ecological value (instead we think of more profitable ways to use of this land, whether by turning it into farms to clearing it to put buildings up on it) etc.

    We stress how this not normal, exploring how many (non-western) communities in the world recognized the need for lettings things exists as
 things. Like the Kikuyu people who despite having a clan-based/individual land ownership system let people farm, and even build on land they didn’t own to ensure everyone’s needs in the community were met. The Wendat who found the French society having many needy beggars against the backdrop of a glamourous nobility class barbaric.

    Lastly, we highlight how people have always recognized the absurdity of this idea of the primacy of profit and meeting market needs over their own, like the Maragua women who rejected the idea of growing coffee to make the country foreign currency to pay off its debts while being unable to feed their own families. We hope that by bringing this knowledge to the forefront of people’s minds, especially a time when (in Kenya) we are again seeing market needs supersede the collective population needs most visibly with draft laws (Livestock Bill 2023, Animal Production Professionals and Technicians Bill 2023 etc.) undermining people’s ability to feed themselves tabled in parliament with the intention of forcing them to be dependent on capitalist agribusiness chains (resulting in more profit for them), we are all reminded that none of this is okay. That maybe, just maybe, we need an economic model built to fulfill our needs, instead of a cruel, barbaric system meant to make profits for a select few. And that we have models all throughout history to draw inspiration from as we take on this work!

  • We begin in Mombasa where, in 1947, workers staged a general strike. Over 10,000 people gathered in a field they called Kiwanja cha Maskini and demanded dignified living and working conditions from the colonial administration.

    Today, the Mombasa port is being contested for privatisation. Dockworkers seem to have no power over their fate, no voice or choice beyond entreating politicians to act on their behalf. What happened? What happened to the militant, powerful unions of the pre-independence era? How did we get to today, where the image of "workers unions" in Kenya conjures images like that of COTU, where union leaders seem to be a part of the capitalist elite they were meant to oppose?

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  • At "Until Everyone Is Free," we're here to talk about power and freedom. Our last season focused on the life and work of Pio Gama Pinto, who organized various movements that paved the way for independence in Kenya. We remember Pinto so that we can understand how Kenya got free without its people getting free
 in other words, why independence is not the same as decolonization.

    On 7 October 2023, Hamas launched an offensive attack on Israel, killing over 1,300 Israelis, over 1,000 of whom were civilians. As of Nov 6, Israel has rained over 18,000 tons of bombs on Gaza, committing war crimes and committing genocide on Palestinians. As of Nov 6, more than 10,000 Palestinians have been killed, including over 4,000 children. It is impossible to count how many have been killed because the genocide has not stopped. The death toll continues to rise—as much of the western world cheers Israel on.

    Many people around the world shake their heads, asking “Why can’t we humans just make peace? Why can’t both sides stop fighting?” Many Kenyans have this attitude too, and many simply feel that this is a very complex history with no end in sight.

    This attitude is shameful and morally bankrupt.

    Kenyans should remember that the Kenya Land and Freedom Army, or Mau Mau, were also called terrorists for their violent resistance. There was violence on “both sides” then too. But most Kenyans seem to understand why the side fighting for their own freedom chose to do so. Kenyans should support those fighting global imperialism, which also oppresses us.

    We created this special episode to help Kenyans understand the parallels between the fight against settler colonialism here and that in Palestine. We dedicate this episode to Palestinians who are teaching us every day what Dedan Kimathi said: “It is better to die on our feet than live on our knees.”

  • When we began UEIF, we could not have imagined that there could be space for a sheng history of Pio Gama Pinto's life and work in a Kenyan museum.   We are beyond proud to share our work at The Pio Gama Pinto Exhibition at the Nairobi Gallery in CBD (next to Nyayo House).

    Join us for the opening ceremony Sun 5 Mar! Admission is free on opening day; Nairobi Gallery fees (150 KES for citizens) apply for the following three months—March through May.

  • You can tell what kind of person someone was by seeing who attends their funeral.

    Pio Gama Pinto was buried at City Park Cemetery. On that day, the park was filled with people. Of course there were his friends from politics. Achieng Oneko, his friend from their days in detention on Manda Island. Bildad Kaggia, from their days routing weapons to Mau Mau forest fighters. Oginga Odinga, his staunchest supporter in government, with whom he fought to make Kenya a more equitable, socialist country. Joseph Murumbi, an old friend from Pinto’s days working at the Desai Memorial Library. Fitz de Souza, the young Goan Pinto had welcomed to Nairobi and brought into Kenya’s freedom fight. And many other politicians that, even if they often disagreed, never doubted that Pinto had a pure heart.

    But many, many ordinary people also came. Many poor people whom Pinto had helped in their time of need. Many elderly Kikuyu traveled to Nairobi from different parts of Central Province to bid farewell to a man who fought alongside them.

    It was a shock to the nation. Kenya had not even been an independent country for two years. And a freedom fighter was killed. He was killed by those who, only just a few years earlier, had fought with him against the British. Killed by his own government.

    So this would be how power would be wielded in our new Kenya.

    One very important person, a man who used to be a good friend of Pinto, a man whom Pinto had fought to be released from detention and who had visited him in Lodwar—this man was missing from the funeral. President Jomo Kenyatta.

    Kenyatta sent an ivory sculpture as a gift. But he did not come.

  • We don’t have many photographs of Pinto. He didn't attend events to be seen. He wasn't the kind of politician who would stand before a crowd of people and deliver a speech.

    The photos we have of him tell us how he spent his time instead. There's a photo of Pinto and Kenyatta, while Mzee was detained at Lodwar, and Pinto and others like Odinga were fighting for his release. There's also a photo of Pinto, Fitz de Souza, and others protesting with signs against Portuguese colonization of Angola. Or a photo of Pinto visiting the family of Senior Chief Koinange while they were in restriction in Kabarnet. Or a photo of Pinto at a reunion of ex-Mau Mau and ex-detainees.

    Pinto was always working behind the scenes. He brought different groups of people together. He helped organizations improve their tactics. When someone needed help—whether that was printing a radical newspaper, getting school fees to families of ex-Mau Mau fighters, or organizing a labor strike—he was there. Pinto was an organizer.

  • We spoke before about how some chapters of history are erased. Today we tell one of those stories. Did you know about the fire that burned in the Happy Valley of Kaloleni for days and days? Did you know about the time that workers from all sectors, from all tribes, came together and brought the city to a grinding halt? Did you know about the General Strike of Nairobi?

    While the General Strike was organized by trade union leaders, most of the people who took part in it—who gathered by the bonfire and raised their fists in the air—they weren't cardholding members of official unions at all. They were unemployed youths. People employed in casual labor. Landless ahoi who were pushed out of reserves. Sex workers. Petty thieves. Criminals, even. They were outcasts. We hear a lot about Mau Mau's role in bringing about independence. But what about the workers and unemployed who joined the General Strike?

  • When we think of the fight for independence, we often think of the part of that struggle that involves weapons. But, at the same time there was a war fought over territory, a parallel war was being fought for minds. In fact, many of the Mau Mau fighters would not have decided to join the freedom fight if it weren't for the work of many small, independent African publications that opened up new, important spaces for public discourse. This was the golden age of the vernacular paper. Kenya would never again have a diverse, grassroots-level journalism ecosystem like this again.

    It was the power of the printed word—now in the hands of Africans—which allowed ideas to spread. And spread. And spread. Published it in a way to help Africans in his time—in this fast-changing time—to help them understand their own power. Their cultural power. And their political power.

    In this episode, we tell the story of two Kenyan journalists. Their work may not resemble the work of journalists today, but it was nothing short of foundational—and may help us rethink what the role of journalists today ought to be.

  • In 2015, a monument honouring the Mau Mau was erected at Freedom Corner in Uhuru Park, Nairobi. Many surviving Mau Mau freedom fighters attended, many traveling by matatu from upcountry, some arriving as early as 6am to await the opening ceremony. This honour is well-deserved, but as these elders—many still impoverished—sat beneath the hot sun as NGOs and Kenyan dignitaries enjoyed the shade of a large white tent, the question that looms is this: did the Mau Mau get what they fought for? And what is it that they fought for? Land and Freedom.

    Pio Gama Pinto said, "If when we have achieved independence, we only have black Lord Delameres instead of white Lord Delameres, we will have achieved very little." He understood that, since land was at the heart of the colonial project, then taking back land would be the key to decolonization, to liberation. 

  • The Mau Mau War has gone down in history—not only in Kenya as a key part of the anti-colonial independence struggle—but in the world. Mau Mau freedom fighters and the mass movement that backed them decided that constitutional, non-violent methods were useless in defeating a violent colonial regime. The only answer was organized violence. Against impossible odds, they did that.

    Although the Mau Mau are heralded today as Kenya's freedom fighters, their history has been sanitized. In this episode, host Stoneface Bombaa narrates and discusses the unsanitized history of Mau Mau and asks the question, if it were us back in the 1950s, where would we stand? Would we play it safe? Or, like Pio Gama Pinto, would we decide to go all in and support this radical, radical movement?

  • Less than two years after gaining independence, Kenya began killing its own freedom fighters. One of the first political assassinations in the history of independent Kenya was in 1965. 

    They killed a man who knew too much. 

    He knew that oppressors will not stop oppressing you if you ask politely, that the only way to defeat British colonizers was through organized violence—so he routed weapons to Mau Mau forest fighters. He knew that stolen land was the root of colonization—so he fought, both before and after independence—to take it back from elites. He knew that colonization was not just economic control, but also mental control—so he supported small, radical newspapers in vernacular languages to spread conversations about freedom. He knew that the struggle of Kenyans was the same as that in India, Angola, South Africa, or in the U.S.—so he created bridges of solidarity across all continents. 

    In other words, this man knew what freedom was. And he knew how to get it.

    In this show, we'll tell you the story of Pio Gama Pinto, Kenyan freedom fighter and socialist. But we tell this story in order to answer a very important question: how did the country of Kenya get freedom.... without the people of Kenya getting free?