The Royal African Society

Kenya's Problems as Seen by a Schoolmaster in Kikuyu Country

Author(s): E. Carey Francis
Source: African Affairs, Vol. 54, No. 216 (Jul., 1955), pp. 186-196
Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of The Royal African Society
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/718578
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186 AFRICAN AFFAIRS

Kenyas Problems as seen by a

Schoolmaster m Kikuyu Country

By E. CAREY FRANCIS, O.B.E., M.A.

This address was given at a joint tneeting of the Royal African and the
Royal Empire Societies on March 31, 1955. Miss A. 19. L. Kelham, M.B. E.,
took Se chair.

T SPEAK not as an expert but as one who, by nrtue of his work, has an
1 unusual window from which to view events. My taLk will be no learned
study of Kenya but a collection of rather random comments drawn from my
own experience on the situation as I see it around me.
I propose to say a few words first on the.school which is my background,
then on educationt land, colour bar, and salaries, and lastly, rather more
fully, on Mau-Mau.
The school in which I have been working for the last 14 years is the
Miance ffigh School at Kikuyu in the Kiambu District, 15 miles west of
Nairobi. It is an African secondary school for boys. " Alliance " means
alliance of missions and are in fact a very happy alliance between
missions and Government, with 200 boys, all boarders, drawn from all
tnbes and all parts of Kenya t about half belong to the Kikuyu, Embu and
Meru tribes and are directly involved in the present emergency.
We are fortunate in that we tend to get the cream intellectually of the boys
of the Colony. They come to us for their last four years of school life, and
in the last year they take the Cambridge School Certificate Examination.
Nowadays it is fashionable for schoolmasters to be almost ashamed of
academic success, but I am unfashionable and am proud of the fact that in
11 years only one boy has failed, and he passed the next year ! Nearly half
get a Grade I pass (which means eight good credits) and it is unusual for a
boy to get less than five credits. Last year rather more than one-sixth of all
the students at Makerere had passed through our hands.
The school is run on the lines of a grammar school in this country but
wth everything simpler, no matrons and no frills. The boys wash their own
clothes and keep the place clean. We engage in much the same activities:
games, dratics (we have produced a full Shakespeare play each year for
the last three years), singing, Scouting and innumerable societies. Boys
have a background poor in the things of European civilization: they know
nothing of wireless and motor bicycles and little of money, and few of them
come from homes where there is intelligent conversation or where books or
even newspapers are regularly read. Yet they are essentiaSly the same as
English boys. They would bear comparison with those of the European
schools in Kenya, or with a good school in this country, in intelligence, in
athletic prowess, in industry, courtesy, courage and trustworthiness, and as

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 KENYA S PROBLEMS 187

gentlemen. This judgment differs from much that is said and written
nowadays about the Africans of Kenya, but it is a considered judgment.
I do not think my worst enemies would call me ? stany-eyed ". I have never
been so encouraged as in the last five or six years: at school almost every
boy clearly grows in streIlgth, knowledge and character.
After school -and it is only " after school " that really matters- -the
picture is not so rosy. The world into which they go is staggeringly difficult;
far harder than it is for us Europeans. Papers are edited, companies floated,
governments denounced by men with the mental equipment of childrell of 14.
There is no settled, ordered, educated African community. Drunkenness
and immorality are common, material possessions can easily seem the only
value, racial tensions are fierce. There are few to help, few to look up to,
many to drag down. I sometimes feel as though I were pushing immature
swimmers out into a turbulent stream.
It is for this world we have to try to prepare boys. More than anything
else we long for them to get a genuine Christian faith. That is the centre of
all we do, but there is no technique which can ensure it. We see that they
learn something of the world into which they are going and I value especially
an hour of general chat I have every week with the top form. In this and
at other times most of the problems I shall speak about today are talked over.
Not every one agrees with my answers indeed, I am not trying for that-
but I think we manage to face facts fairly, to see that there are several sides
to most questions, to learn that slogans are unwise guides, that problems
have no magical solutions but do usually yield to straight thinking and
good will.
In the school itself we see some answers, for example, to the problem
of relations between tribes. The tribes of Kenya are as different as the
natioSns of Europe and get on with one another about as badly. In the school
we face that problem in miniature-our boys last year came from more than
20 different tribes. Once there was continual friction; for a Kikuyu prefect
to " tick off " a Luo boy might assume the proportions of an iIlternational
incident. But there has not been anything of this sort for many years.
Africans of every tribe have learned to work together and to respect each
other and many friendships cut across tribal hatreds. To a less extent the
far more difficult estrangement between black and white, so much of which
also arises from ignorance, is eased. Games with European schools, " Out-
ward Bound" courses, our life together in the school, all help to bring
understanding to both sides.
I should like to dispose of the idea occasionally met with in this country
that the Government neglects African education, fobs Africans off with an
inferior article, has no real concern for their advancement. I find that quite
untrue. In the school I get magnificent backing financially and otherwise
from the Education Department. There are no crying material needs, and if
there were I know that they would be sympathetically dealt with. In other
educational matters I sometimes act as representative of the missions in
their talks with Government I do not always find agreement with my

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 AFRICAN AFFAIRS
188

proposals - but I do always find a readiness to listen and to

and a desire as genuine as ours to discover the line of action whi
the greatest benefit to Africans.
At all levels education is being pressed forward and adv
even during the emergency. Almost no school has been close
been added. The independent schools, once under Kenyatta,
all been reopened ander other management, some with obviou
Such shortage as there is-too many leave school after four years
the shortage of teachers. This means that the teaching is p
places, but strenuous efforts are being made to train teacher
good and many apply.
The road to education is open to African boys and girls eve
are poor. No boy of the right standard is debarred from seco
by poverty; bursaries make up the fees he cannot pay. A si
enables those who qualify to go on to Makerere and get there
excellent professional training. Those who would benefit by
university in this country get bursaries which cover the full co
can go on as far as his perforrnance warrants. In 26 years I c
no case of a boy of mine who has been forced to fall out wh
have carried on.

On land my words will be few. I speak because I know a lit

Africans think. To them land is of supreme importance. They re
not unnaturally, as primarily an African country. They are s
especially the Kikuyu. Alongside their holdings of two or thr
see European farms of hundreds and thousands of acres. Neit
that Europeans have usually made far better use of the land t
have done, nor an old promise of the British Government, make
to bear. I know well the arguments on the other side, but I b
some Africans with proper safeguards were not only allowed but
farm in parts of the White Highlands two things would ha
they would justify the experiment, secondly, such a gesture
would do more to save Kenya than the killing of many gangster
Almost all Africans believe themselves to be subject to a co
with some reason. There is a colour bar in most hotels and r
In one sense that is not a vital matter, in that few Africans want
and restaurants, but it attracts much notice, and it is indeed abs
cannot easily take to tea in Nairobi an African master or an
from the school. That bar should go, and I think it soon will dis
There has often been a great difference in salaries offered: to
refer later.

But most Africans imagine that there is a much more serious bar which
shuts them out from important posts because they are Africans, which holds
them down: that I believe to be false. I have repeatedly challenged Form
Six to produce examples of men kept out in this way but I know of none
and believe that there are none. On the contrary, I find that wherever an
African is doing well the Europeans round him are glad and eager for his

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 KENYA S PROBLEMS 189

merit to be recognised by promotion. If he has the necessary ability, integrity

and " stickability " there is no limit to his progress. Indeed, I have known
a number of examples of what I might call colour bar in reverse where
Africans are holding posts because they are Africans.
There is, however, a colour bar which matters. It is of a different kind
and cannot be dealt with by legislation. It is found in the lack of courtesy
and consideration and imagination with which Africans are commonly
treated by a section of the European community. Wild, offensive things are
said about them even in their presence. There are many places where a
European, but not an African, can get a hearing hence the " baruas "
for which we are so often asked. Africans are liable to be messed about,
shouted at, ignored, made to feel that because they are Africans they are of
no account. All this does immense harm and has been aggravated by the
emergency. The greatest single cause of bitterness in Kenya I believe to be
the feeling Sisi wanyama tu - " We are only animals ".
I have also seen the reverse of that picture, the startling dividend in good
will and gratitude when a District Commissioner issues a pass with a smile
of takes an interest in his caller and addresses him as though he were a
fellow man who mattered. In these difficult days when they are hard pressed
the administration has been particularly understanding and thoughtful in
its dealings with school boys.
Let me turn to the salary problem and set out the data. The average
African taxpayer lives at a rate of, say, ?30 a year-I can easily get a man to
work in my garden for 50s. a month. The average European earns ?800 a year
or more. Both these extremes are fixed, determined by outside causes. Most
Afncans are not wage earners: that is the rate at which they live depends
on the land they have and world prices. It can be altered, but only slowly.
At the other end the high European salaries are designed to attract from
overseas men of good quality. There is no sign of a nush of applicants and
it would be difficult to reduce these rates.
There are the two fixed points: ?30 and ?800. In between come educated
Africalls, old boys, for exasnple, of my school. The salary of a Makerere
teacher is not determined by an outside cause but by a commission which
thinks of a number.
Which way should that African look ? Up to the European salaries or
down to the African taxpayer who pays him and for whom he works ?
There yop have one of the most important and most intractable of Kenya's
problems and either decision puts us into many difficulties. Africans are
clear that they should look up. They have seen even local Europeans no
better than they in qualifications and probably no better in character
earning two or three times their salaries. They claim equal pay for equal
work. The recent Lidbury Commission has supported them and I hear that
the Kenya Govemment has adopted the Lidbury Report. The Makerere
graduate teacher now begins at ?647 a year.
Yet I, who hold strongly that a manss salary should not depend on the
colour of his skin, am not happy about that solution. To me the high salaries

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 190 AFRICAN AFFAIRS

necessanly paid to imported Europeans are temporary anomalies, analogous

to the high rates which would have to be paid to Americans who had to be
brought to this country in order to instal some new and unfamiliar American
machinery-rates which would obnously be dangerous standards on which
to base the salary structure in Britain.
The absurdity shows in small matters: for example, a local teacher
African or European, may retire on pension at the age of 5V and is expected
to retire at 55.
I do not belielre that any country can afford to have its social services run
by mer3 who earn twenty times as much as those they serve. I am especially
worrie(l by one consequence of this immense disparity betweeIl the monetary
rewards for the ordirlary merl and for thF civil servants. It means that the
oIlly jobs desirable financially are civil sex^+rice jobs. If I except owners of
beer-shops and of loes, and politicians, Africans can hardly ever employ
educated Africans.
Take, for example, an African clergyman. It is with the greatest difficulty
that his coIlgregation (?30 a year aGrerage) can pay him ?120 a year, and yet
that is nof a quarter of the salary of a Makerere man at the begiilning in the
civil service. The clergyman is only an example of an important class:
any community should have skilled and semi-skilled workers including
people like carpenters, bllilders and the rest, dependent direct:ly on the
community.
It is because of this that we halre the tremexldous and often spurious
demand for education which is really a demmd for civil service jobs. From
my sehool every boy can get one; there is not the slightest difficulty about
employment, but lt is very different at lower levels. Each year thousands of
boys leave primary axld intermediate schools and cannot get civil service
jobs and they are likely to hang about and demand for:her education or
waste money on correspondence courses for which they are not fittedJ or hope
that somehow they can get absorbed into a beer-shop, a bus company or a
political racket Many degenerate into discontented " spivs 9', recruiting
matenal for Mau-Mau. It is one of the greatest and saddest of Kenyass
problems.
Sir Philip Mitchell in " African After-thoughts ' has hard things to say
about those who reggd Mau-Man as a resistance movement. That it is such
is nevertheless my first and central postulate, Ox1e which seems to me to put
the whole situation into perspectiere. I asn not praising Man-Mau, it is evil
through and through, and has done immense harm to Afncan and Ellro,pean
alike; but it is a resistance movemente Once you grant thett Europeans
Eare enemy invaders, that they have stolen African land, are llolding Africans
dovvn, are fattening themselves on African labollr and African possessions,
the stage is set for a resistance movement. These things are talen for granted
by the great majority of Afncans in Kenya today. They are untrue, but the
persistent propaganda of unscrupulous men has planted them firmly in
African minds.

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 KENYA S PROBLEMS 191

This propaganda, emanating chiefly from KAU (lvhe Kenya Afncan

Union) feeds upon the genuine grievances:
The discourtesy of many EuropeansI put this first;
Land shortage;
Low wages;
Bad housing in towns.
It imnes greater gIievances than actually exist in rtard to colour bar
and the " theft " of African land by Europeans. It encourages the envy
which is almost inevitable when two such different staIldards of linng
exist alongside one another. And all these grievances have been fanned by
outside politicians.
For these and other reasons the propaganda has been successful. There
is a resistance movement with the slogalls:
" Europeans must go '
'< Give us back our land "
?' Self-government "
" Freedom."
It has bitten deep into the emotions of the people and has some of the
attributes of a religion, but a religion based on hate.
Through no fault of his own one of our old boys spent a night last year
in a police cell in Nairobi. I would like to read to you a little of the account
he gave to me when he was released of what happened in that cell:
One pnsoner reminded the others of Kenyatta's prophecy which
was being fulfilled. How, at a meeting, Kenyatta had asked if they
wanted freedom. They had artswered that they did. He had gone
on to say, " I see you want freedom but it will be very difficult. Some
will go to prison. There will be much bloodshed. Myself I shall hold
the arlimal (by this ' axiimal ' he meant ' freedom ') and the part
I shall hold will be its head. I shall never let it go I " The pnsoners
sang a Mau-Mall hyma.
Later, when a thief was brought in at + a.m. and descnbed his
attempted theft from an Indian shop, and his arrest, " the prisoners
clapped him and said that he was doing the right thing. He was
workiIlg for their freedom because he was trying to impoverish the
enemy-Indians and Europsans".

Like resistance movements in the war Mau-Mau fights not only against
European invaders but even more fiercely against African collaborators.
Its great appeal is to the unity of the African tribe. The KAU motto was
" Unity is strength ".
" Are you a Kikuyu ? Come with us."
" Are you a son of Mumbi ? Be brave, join us."
" Or are you a coward, a traitor, a quisling, a white man in a
black skin ? "
It is an immensely powerful appeal to a good side of a man's nature, and
wheIl that is reinforced by the appeal to fear only the strongest can stand out.
Europeans find it difficult to understand how there are many good Africans
who are passive in their attitude to Mau-Mau, but had I been a Frenchman
who hated the ways of the Maquis and regarded them as dangerous cut-

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 AFRICAN AFFAIRS
192

throats I should still not have given them away to the Germans. I
thing like that.
We shall never destroy Mau-Mau by killing gangsters or imprisoning oath-
takers, we shall destroy it only by disposing of the foundations on which
it rests by showing that we are not enemy invaders.
You will have heard much of the stand made against Mau-Mau by the
African Church. Not by all African Christians by any means. Most, like
most Europeansa have a faith which was largely nominal and they collapsed.
Others, rather better, had a faith which was second-hand, based upon what
others had told them and what they had read: they, too, usually went down
before the onslaught. But there were other Christians made of sterner stuff.
I, a missionary, had never realised their quality until it was put to the test.
In those days they were the core of resistance to the new faith of Mau-Mau
when it sought the allegiance of every Kikuyu, because they opposed it by
a greater faith and a faith which was based not on hate but on love. They
believed in Jesus Christ so surely that they were not afraid to die. Many
of them have been hated and ostracized, robbed, tortured and killed and
they still stood firm. I have seen it. Some, especially the members of the
revival movement, have loved back indeed, some have got into trouble
with the authorities for being pacifists.
In most ways the emergency has caused deterioration in relations between
Afncans and Europeans, but the bravery of these Christians has worked the
other way and established a new bond. European Christian congregations
in Nairobi have contributed generously to the relief of their distress.
Nowadays, the Government is very friendly to Christianity. There is a
dangerous side. I am dubious about Chnstianity " because it is useful ";
there might be a time when it was not useful arld we should still have to stand
for Christianity " because it is true "; but in this emergency there is no
doubt that Chnstianity has been and is useful.
Lately, criticism has been directed against the Kenya Government and
its security forces. I should be cowardly and unrealistic if I did not say what
I think. I must begin with a tribute which is obnously due. I shall tell you
that we at the school are happy and at peace: we are so only because the
security forces have been fighting Mau-Mau on our behalf. Mau-Mau failed
to stampede either the African Church or the European settlers. For many
of these latter life has been rudely interrupted. They have left farm and
home and comfort for a job which is highly unpleasant and dangerous.
Surrounded by lies and treachery, opposed by a cunning and ruthless enemy
difficult to recognise, forced to use poor human material, they have fought
with bravery and determination and have gone on fighting as the weary
months have passed by.
I have had glimpses into the life of a modern District Officer. His small
house reminds me of a Field Headquarters; armed men rushing in and out
at all times. He is frequently called out at night on military operations.
Amid the clamour of war he has to make returns aIld dea;l svith the hundred
and one {' shauris " which have always come to Distnct Officers, to issue

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 KENYA S PROBLEMS 193

innumerable passes, to establish new villages, to organise the Home Guard.

He is harassed and over-worked, and may well be over-wrought, Those who
do these things deserve the gratitude of all good men.
Through their efforts the country is much safer than it was. I hope and
think that the gangs in the forests are being slowly eliminated. I believe
that in certain parts Afncan opinion is turning from Mau-Mau. But the
defeat of Mau-Mau is more than the defeat of the gangs It is as important
for the fight to be clean as that it should be victorious. To many people in
Kenya that would seem an absurdly sentimental remark. " You should see
what Mau-Mau do," they say, but I believe that to be irrelevant. " You
do not fight guerilla warfare by the methods of the Y.M.C.A." says Lord
Winterton, but if we cannot fight as Christian men we had better not fight
at all. Some of the fight has not been clean. We have sometimes used the
weapons of Mau-Mau, hatred, fear, nolence, lies, and the appeal to uxiity
even for wrong purposes. " We must make them as afraid of us as they are
of Mau-Mau" has been a commonly heard slogan of security forces, and
they have succeeded. In some areas the average Kikuyu has hardly lnown
which to fear the more, the Mau-Mau or the forces of law and order. By
both, men have been robbed, beaten, carried off and killed, and there is
almost no hope of redress. They hardly ever try for it. To whom should
they go ?
Last year, for example, the chief trouble was from the African Home
Guard who have commonly interrogated suspects by beating them until they
confessed- many, of course, confessed without beating because they knew
what was coming if they did not. Some of the confessions have been
genuine.
All who know Afncans know that these things are tme. Tthere is not the
slightest doubt about them. They are not just the inentable over-riding
of individual rights by war. The excuses commonly made are invalid. They
are not isolated instances; I am not talking about the odd " black sheep "
to be found in every flock. Offences have been common, ordinary. All the
flock are not " black ", but the " white '> do not restrain the black. I am
not speaking of " legal niceties ", nor of " things done in the heat of battle,"
of " too enthusiastic a loyalty ", or " an excess of zeal '} and so on, but of
cold-blooded deliberate injustice. It is nonsense to attribute this to moral
indignation at the wickedness of Mau-Mau. The Government has sometimes
tracked down offenders and brought them to tnal but these cases are a
fraction of the whole and in them there has often been pressure from a*l
outside agency, a settler, a missionary, more recently the C.I.D. The
'' interference Js iS not welcomed.
Ihe great and genuine excuse, that so few good men, black or white,
are available, that posts of portance have had to be filled by men of poor
quality, is not often heard. Seldom have I found that Europeans in charge
really mind or show enthusiasm to eradicate the evil and punish the wrong-
doers, although I have met two exceptions. Men boast openly of brutality.
Injus'ice persists because many in the forces believe in injustice.
13 AA 54

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194 AFRICAN AFFAIRS

I have faith in the British Empire and the great traditions for which it
stands, and it is because of that faith that I am saying these things. But I
think it is wrong that I and people like me should have to say them. The
Government and the security forces and the people of Kenya should be
jealous for the good name of the Colony, Ilot by denolmcing critics but by
finding out what is wrong and dealing with it by investigating fearlessly,
quickly, impartially eveiy responsible complaint, by admitting fault publicly
when they find it and by punishing, I think publicly, those who are guilty.
Instead, Kenya is pathologically sensitive to cnticism. The Young Settlers'
Protection Association advertises for money for the defence of members of
the Security Forces; fines imposed are at once paid by well wishers; demands
for enquiry and petitions for release follow the few convictions almost auto-
matically; the mild protests made by the Church are violently resented.
There are liberal-minded people disgusted at what happens bu$ few will
face the obloquy which follows action. Some have done so. Several of the
cases of which you have read have followed pressure by settlers who stand
for nght rather than European solidarity. To do so requires as much courage
as for a Kikuyu to denounce Mau-Mau in his own home.
Impeccable directives come from above, resulting in some improvement,
but far more drive is needed to see that they are obeyed. Machinery should
be set up so that any ordinary citizen may without fear of retaliation bring
a complaint and have it dealt with justly. He must feel confidence in the
one to whom he complains and feel that he is independent of the one com-
plained about. As a minor measure I sllggest that kibokos be abolished
We shall only win if we so live and so act that Africans see that we are not
enemy invaders.
FiIlally, let me speak of the impact of Mau-Mau upon the schools. Many
pnmary schools, especially those once independent, have been attacked;
many {eachers have been killed. Soon after the Lari massacre, 16 miles away,
I went to a primary school four miles from us with a party of boys who were
managing a Sunday school therc-- we have ten such schools and volunteer
boy teachers teach some 2,000 children every Sunday afternoon. At the
one I went to there was a disaster. Mau-Mau had been there the night before,
and damaged the school, tearing down the doors and leaving broken windows
and broken hinges. In the dooIway there was a blackboard with a message
written on it in Kikuyu: " If anyone teaches here after March 29 he will be
killed, by order of Dedan Kimathi '). (Dedan Kimathi is one of the leaders
of the gangs.) It was meant for the teachers of the primary school. One
was there but I did not feel I could ask what he was going to do next morning.
I went back on the following Sunday and found that he and his fellow teacher
had carried on as usual. At another school something similar happened.
There the message was a letter for the teacher saying " If the teacher comes
here again he had better bring a basket for his head ". He, too, camed on.
Today, despite the emergency, despite the fact that many fathers are
Mau-Mau, the primaIy schools that I know are happy places full of eager,
friendly children.

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 KENYA S PROBLEMS 195

Our own school, with I think all secondary schools, has been left alone,
but, of course, the homes of the boys are affected. Five boys hatre had th
fathers killed by Mau-Mau. For every Kikuyu boy home is a grim and often
a dangerous place. Since the emergency I have forced no boy to go home for
the holidays. Thirty has been an average number staying; $ometimes
some harre gone home for a day or two and then come back saying " Home
is too hot". It is an indication of the safer condition of the country that
last holidays there was a sudden drop and only six asked to stay. These
holiday paxties have been strikingly gay in spirit; they have done a lot of
good work on the school grounds and bliildings; several times they have
got up a play ready for the school when it re-assembled.
Some boys have taken the oath-r think none willingly. One who did so
found his father, unknown to him, in the Mau-Mau crowd. Several have told
me how their mothers did their best to get them to take the oath. (Should
they, by the way, denounce their fathers aIld mothers to the police ?) One
remark I might make which has some interest is that my experience is that
the oath itself has no terrors for an educated African boy. They are frightened
of the retaliation from the Mau-Mau people; they are not frightened of the
oath.
Mau-Mau activity has varied, sometimes near, sometimes far away.
We try to take sensible precautions in much the same way as a ship does
boat drill, but our aim has been not to get rattled and to go on as usual.
Except that Scout camps and school excursions have been cancelled we have
been able to do our ordinary work and carry on our ordinary activities.
The Kikuyu boys have a surprising resilience which enables them to throw off
their troubles and get down to matters in hand. There is no tension and not
a vestige of hostility. The dramatic society put on a veiy respectable
" Julius Caesar" last term; the term before we broke twelve athletic
records; the School Certificate results just out are as good as ever.
Trouble might come; we have had our alarrns; but I believe that this
is the right way and that our chief contribution to the emergency is to go on
trying to produce the right kind of men, men, as the School Prayer puts it,
" strong in body and mind and character " who will go out in the Narne and
with the power of Christ to serve their fellows faithfully.
Most of the Kenya picture is dark; this is one of the brighter patches.
These young Africans from our school and others like it are inexperienced
and will make many mistakes and need much guidance but they are excellent
material, capable, friendly, eager to do the right, biddable, unspoiled by the
present tragedy. In them I see great hope.

Discussion
A IMBER said she could not understand how Mau-Mau appealed to any good side
of a man's nature. the did not understand how anybody who had undergone the oath
ceremonies could lead a decent life. White settlers were perturbed because they felt the
takers of the oaths were dehumanised and something should be done to re-establish
their independent personalities.

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 196 AFRICAN AFFAIRS

MR. CAREY FRANCIS said that Mau-Mau appealed Ior unity, for a man to stzmd as one
of a tribe. Most Africans felt that the Europeans were enemy invaders and the appeal
to them was of the same kind as appeals to join the European resistance movements
in the war. When he said the boys were able to throw off their troubles he did not mean
that they had been involved in anything bestial. Some of them had taken one oath-
the alternative was to be killed but he would be very surprised if any of them had
taken part in any of the more bestial sides of Mau-Mau.
A MEMBER asked the meaning of kiboko, to which Mr. CAREY FRANCIS replied that it
was a whip made of hippopotamus hide.
A MEMBER said she had been a settler in Kenya for nearly 30 years. She asked if
Mr. FRANCIS considered there was any hope in the various multi-racial movements, the
Kenya Guild which was started by Africans and in which Africans and Europeans
came together to discuss the things on which they agreed. Was there any hope in the
Capricorn Society or in the relationship set up by the Africans and Europeans who had
fought Mau-Mau side by side ?
MR. FRANCIS said he hoped he had not implied that there was no hope of co-operation
and friendship between the races. He hoped for it, looked for it, and believed it would
come. Wherever there was a good European or African gathenng of likvminded fellows
around him there was an area of hope, and thingswere easier. He welcomed every attempt
at understanding, including the agencies mentioned.
It was asked if similar talks to the one they had just heard were given in Kenya.
It was there that a change of heart was needed, not here. MR. FRANCIS said he had
not addressed any kind of official meeting. He had tried to talk privately with the
people concerned and with people who could put things right. He had spoken at the
Prince of Wales School, the Duke of York School, and the Limuru Girls' School
stressing some of the points he had stressed in his address but he had not addressed any
political meetings; he did not belong there and he did not believe any good would be
done by so doing.
A MEMBER asked if Mr. FRANCIS could say anything about the apparently growing
nfluence of the Kenya Council of Churches which had attracted a good deal of attention
here. MR. F^RANCIS replied that the first union was called the Alliance of Missions as a
result of which his school was started years ago. More recently this had been repiaced
by a Christian Council which churches, individuals and bodies such as the Y.M.C'A.
and the like had been able to join. Practically all Christian bodies, Sexcept the Romas
Catholic community, had joined and tried to help. Through this Council Christians were
trying to organise rehabilitation work in the camps and the like. The new secretary
who had been in charge of Arab Relief Work, understood that sort of thing and was
doing much. All the educational contacts of Missions with Government were through
the Christian Council. It was doing valuable work in bnnging together Christiaa
belonging to different regiments in the one army.
It was asked whether things would not have improved if martial law had been declared
at the beginning of the emergency ? What were the speaker's views on a recent publica-
tion by DF. Christopher Wilson " Kenya's Warning" ? MR. FRANCIS said he did not
know what difference it would have made if mattial law had been proclaimed. Dr.
Wilson was a neighbour and a fnend of his own although their views were not the same
on everything. Dr. Wilson's book he thought one-sided and he would put alongside
" Kenya's Warning " his own judgment that the boys at a school like his rrould bear
comparison as gentlemen with the boys of a European school in Kenya or a good school
in this country.
A MEMBER said that it was clear that the tradition of the boy going unwillingly to
school was not true in Kenya. How did the ordinary African child compazo in natural
intelligence and the power of leariing with the ordinary English chilxl ? Did the speaker
make allowance for the fact that he had the cream of African youth through his hands ?
MR. FRANCIS replied that it was true that he got the better boys but he sawr no kind of
fuIldamental difference. Probably innate ability was about the same although the
African's background was much poorer. A danger was that the things learat at school
lmight be kept apart and never brought into life to deal with its problems. In his time
he had known three boys whose ability might have beexl of Open Scholarship Standard.
He did Ilot know how the Prince of Wales or Duke of York Schools would compare
ill this regard but in general he saw little difference. It was said that Africans learnt
1hings parot fashion, but if they were taught properly that did not happen.

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