Throughout history, various religions have been manipulated as tools to further the agendas of oppressive forces. It was the destiny of a visionary Kenyan nationalist to flip this narrative and use religion as a tool for liberation. His name was Masinde wa Nameme, the founder of one of East Africa’s most radical anti-colonial religious movements that shifted mindsets and united communities all around the country.
A Hybrid Religion Sprouted
Masinde was born in 1910 in Kimilili, Bungoma. His career of choice was football as he worked as a professional sportsperson, representing the country at the 1930 CECAFA Cup. Apart from sports, Masinde’s other calling was religion.
Having converted to Christianity at a young age, he had learned from the teachings of the Irish Friends African Mission. A free thinker, Masinde soon noticed that the mission was preaching anti-African sentiment by encouraging locals to abandon their traditional beliefs which they deemed to be blasphemous. Masinde quarrelled with a missionary when he opposed the adoption of European names and forsaking African ways of life for European ones, such as monogamy. He was suspended for a year and was officially banned when he, in alignment with his Bukusu culture, married a second wife. Masinde saw no reason to follow the missionaries’ authority but instead chose to approach Christianity in his own way and apply the Bible to the African context, which led him to found his own religion, Dini ya Msambwa.
Dini ya Msambwa’s Popularity in East Africa
The word msambwa translates to ancestral custom. This was at the core of the Dini ya Mswamba doctrine, which encouraged Africans to regard their indigenous practices as valuable. The religion was not simply another Christian denomination. Instead, it was a hybrid religion that fused the tenets of Christian teachings with traditional African culture, as its followers believed that their god was meant to lead Africans back to their cultures from which they had been dislocated by European colonisation
As an African nationalist, Masinde also spoke against the appropriation of African land by British invaders and championed the abolition of the kipande system, a dehumanising identification system which required African Kenyans to wear documents in chains around their necks as a means of controlling their movement and suppressing their labour rights. Dini ya Msambwa also championed free education as a means of liberating the mind, and they set up Matili Village Polytechnic and Bituyu Primary School in Bungoma.
The religion was as much a political movement as it was spiritual. Masinde’s revolutionary beliefs spread beyond Western Kenya and were adopted by communities including the Bagisu, the Pokot and communities in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Other notable leaders of the movement included Lucas Pkiech, Danisio Nakimayu, and Musa Washiuku Wanzala.
The Kolloa Masscare of 1950
Dini ya Msambwa’s growth and popularity alarmed the British as they saw the movement as a threat to their imperial ideologies. In an attempt to stamp out the religion, its practise was banned, and brutal methods were used to curb its spread. These included beatings, imprisonment, and sentences to years of hard labour.
Leaders including Masinde and Pkiech were arrested, the former of whom was deported to Lamu in 1948. Pkiech luckily managed to flee his imprisonment and continued spreading the word in Kolloa in Baringo, preaching in his language and calling it Dini ya Yomut. His work was disrupted when the British armed forces ambushed Pkiech and a crowd of his listeners on Monday April 24th, 1950, on a mission to recapture him. The crowd of nearly 300 refused to let Pkiech be taken without a fight, and, in retaliation, the officers opened fire, killing Pkiech and countless others. Twelve of those who were present on the day were tried in Kapenguria and seven of them were executed. The British colonial government further punished the locals by forcing them to sell off livestock as compensation for daring to oppose their colonial rule.
Honouring our lesser-known heroes
Over the next few decades, Masinde was detained multiple times, both by pre-independence and post-independence governments. He continued to agitate for citizens’ rights post-independence, up until his death in 1987.
We salute these forgotten Kenyan heroes who sparked a fierce anti-colonial movement with thousands of followers, whose legacy endures to this day.
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