King Charles’s expression of “greatest sorrow and deepest regret” over colonial atrocities committed by British forces in Kenya has been criticised as a “miss” in the east African country.
Reactions to the king’s statement were mixed, with the president, William Ruto, diplomatically welcoming Charles’s “courage and readiness to shed light on uncomfortable truths that reside in the darker regions of our shared experience”, but calling Britain’s colonial suppression of Kenya’s freedom movement “monstrous in its cruelty”.
“Much remains to be done in order to achieve full reparations,” said Ruto, who struck a reconciliatory tone by emphasising the need to “learn from history to foster relations between the two nations”.
King Charles’s first visit to a Commonwealth country since his accession has been marked by unprecedented calls for the UK to offer an unequivocal apology and reparations for colonial atrocities.
Human rights groups and historians said they were unimpressed by the king’s “careful choice of words”, and the two countries needed to “move beyond platitudes”.
“This was a ‘miss’,” said Ernest Cornel, of the Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC). The rights body had called on King Charles to address colonialism’s enduring legacies, including land dispossession.
About 500,000 Kenyans from the Kipsigis and Talai communities were violently evicted from their ancestral lands under colonial rule, according to UN experts. Huge tracts of their land, given to British settlers, were developed into the vast British-owned tea plantations. Today, generations of the dispossessed Kipsigis and Talai communities continue to live in poverty.
In 2019, the British government indicated that it had “no intention to enter any process” to settle the communities’ claims. A case contesting the land expropriation is before the European court of human rights.
Discussions on colonial atrocities have resurfaced online, with activists recalling painful aspects of colonial history during the height of the country’s fight for independence between 1952 and 1960. Mau Mau suspects were forced to eat faeces and urine, one recalled, and Kenyan women were raped and humiliated by having bottles, hot eggs and other items thrust up their vaginas.
“If you’ve watched those [colonial] documentaries, your blood boils,” said Wanjira Wanjiru of the Kenya Social Justice Centres, a community mobilising group. “For us, he is the representation of when our ancestors experienced that shame and humiliation in their own land, so for him not to say ‘I apologise’, it pains me.”
Elderly Kenyans and rights groups also demanded that King Charles reveal the burial locations of freedom fighters, including Dedan Kimathi, and return the skull of Koitalel Arap Samoei, an anti-colonial leader of the Nandi people whose severed head was taken to the UK as a souvenir of war.
Researchers say that, as past and present rights violations have not been remedied, the king’s statement of “regret” and “sorrow” rings hollow.
“The statement of regret is happening in a vacuum,” said Suhayl Omar, an historian of the colonial era. The statement “co-opted” the colonial experience and made an appearance of amends without addressing the enduring aspects of colonial legacy, he said.
The Kenyan public’s reaction to the king’s visit has been mixed. Some have called on the UK to address rights issues, while others have seemed indifferent or been intrigued by lighter moments, such as the king’s use of Swahili and Sheng greetings during the state banquet.
Young people expressed different views on bilateral relations.
“We don’t need to forget [history], but we can put it behind us,” said John Karanja, a 23-year-old university student in Nairobi.
Others say atrocities still persist, citing more recent alleged rights violations by British army units training in Kenya, including murder, sexual abuse and environmental damage. Planned demonstrations about those claims were blocked this week, according to the KHRC.
“There is still an unequal partnership between the UK and Kenya,” said Wanjiru. “As young people, we want those issues to be addressed.”
The KHRC has called for assessments of human rights infringements of the British military and multinationals operating in Kenya. It also called on the UK to make reparations for colonial atrocities.
