Kenya has evolved through the years that it has been habituated. Kenya is part of the (EAC) or Eastern African Community. Kenya is a republic and its largest city which is also its capital city is Nairobi.
Kenya is a beautiful nation that has a tropical climate that lines the Indian ocean coastline. The Savanah grasslands however are much cooler, the nation of Kenya borders Tanzania and Uganda. Within the Central Rift valley there is a population of about 48 million people. Kenya’s population is on average quite young being around the age of 34.
Kenya’s economic products are varied as they include tea and coffee which are Kenya’s big cash crops and bring in a large amount of revenue. Some of Kenya’s natural resources are coconuts, pineapples, cashew nuts, cotton, sugarcane, and sisal. Hydroelectricity is the largest source of electricity to Kenya.
Kenya by the end of 2018 wants to have a nuclear power plant built which would employ dozens of Kenyans. Kenya is well known for their topographical variety. The low-lying fertile costal region is lined with coral reefs and islands. Kenya being located between the Indian Ocean and Lake Victoria allowed people and still allows people from all over Africa and the Middle East to travel and trade across Kenya.
One of the negative facts about Kenya is that its capital Nairobi is home to one of the biggest slums. Unfortunately, the environment has changed do to population growth causing soil erosion and the deforestation of the forest. Sadly, water pollution has increased due to urban and industrial waste. Kenya’s animal world includes leopards, cheetahs, lions, elephants and rhinoceros. The political scene in Kenya is a little bit different than in the United States or Europe and Asia, the president serves in several positions he is not only is the president, but he is the Head of state and head of the government. Kenya has the distinct pleasure of being low in the corruption percentage which is good considering that a lot of the other African nations have been prone to corruption and shady deals.
Kenya has close ties with the Swahili speaking neighbors in the African Great Lake Region. Kenya’s military power is stronger than one might think, Kenya has an Army, Air force, and Navy. The Kenyan military is regularly deployed on peace keeping missions around the world. Unfortunately, Kenya’s military not like the government is susceptible to corruption. The Kenyan armed forces date back to 1896. Kenya’s military force is nothing to scoff at however, the Kenyan military force consists of 127 aircraft, 17 interceptors, 17 fixed wing attack aircraft, 41 transport planes, 64 helicopters and 27 trainer aircraft. They have one of the best military forces in Africa and they are the best equipped military force on the continent of Africa. Operation protect the nation was a major operation in Kenya back in 2011 which objective was to wipe out the insurgents like the Al Shabaab.
The Kenyan Air force did bombing runs on the insurgent bases. They continue to fight against the insurgents who try to spread their terrorist ideals. Kenya has a huge diverse ethnic group with the largest linguistic group being in Africa. There are 60 different languages spoken in Kenya and more than 40 ethnic groups. These groups include the Bantus, Nilotes, Cushitic, and small Arab and Indian groups. In Kenya there two official language groups in Kenya English and Swahili.
British English is the primary language in Kenya. From 1921 to 1963 Kenya was a colony of the United Kingdom, at that time they became a republic with a president, and a National assembly called a Bunge. Scientist believe that Tanzania Northern Kenya was the birth place of humans. Slavery was a big part of Kenya which is a dark part of Kenya’s history, during the 1600’s and the 1700’s a large group of Kenyans were kidnapped and taken by Arabs, Americans and the European as slaves. Slavery would be outlawed in the 19th century. Kenya has one of the most dynamic and advanced heath care systems in the Sub-Saharan Africa. There are private clinics that are run by nurses, as of 2011 they were 65,000 register nurses and around 8,600 doctors. Kenya has 47 counties and each one has a hospital, tourism has maintained Kenya’s second economic income.
Other contributors to the economy is fishing, forestry, and auto parts. Kenya has a good growth rate in recent years. Kenya’s music culture contributes to the economy as well, Kenya has a diverse collection of music. The Congolese for example is an important rhythm in the country, this rhythm is a complex set of drum beats, however today most popular Kenyan music includes guitar music. Afro-pop is a popular band in Africa by Kenyan singer Sauti Sol. Music is sung in Kiswahili or English, but Lingala is emerging more popular.
The history of music in Kenya dates back hundreds of years, tales are told through music in many African nations, there are forty-two groups of indigenous people in Kenya and they have diverse types of music. These groups include Isukuiti which associate with the Abaluhya, Sengenya with the Mijikenda, Kilumi associated with the Akamba and the Mwomboko which is associated with Agikyu. Kenya has a diverse religious makeup, Christianity is the primary denomination. Protestant makes up the largest group with about 47%.
The Angelica church of Kenya is a large group as well as the Seventh Day Adventist and the Presbyterian church of East Africa with the other denominations such as reformed, Methodists, Baptist, Lutheran, and Pentecostal. However, there are several Evangelical churches and independent Africa Christian churches. Islam is another religion that dominates the nation.
The groups who are followers of Islam include Sunni and Shite Muslims. These Muslim groups can be found in Mombasa and in the neighboring coastal regions. Religious myths play a significant role in the Nation of Kenya. Kikuya are a large ethnic group in Kenya who speak a beautiful language called Bantu. This ethnic group lives in the slopes that form Mount Kenya. The first of these Kikuyu lived in a village with the same name and that village is still there. The word Kuyu means a fig and Kikuyu is a fig tree which in Africa is a symbol of fertility as well as in Asia. There is a story in the Kikuyu people that is Kikuyu had nine daughters, who became the ancestral mothers of the nine major clans of the Kikuyu nation.
With the Kikuyu people the word Ngai means God. It is said that during the creation of the earth God gave certain gifts to the nation. To the Kikuyu nation he gave the knowledge of and the tools for agriculture to which the Kikuyus always excelled. They believed that God controlled the rain and thunder. God punished evil doers. There is a belief that if a man murders another man his spirit will torment him until he turns himself in.
Kenya has a lot of natural resources in minerals to include limestone, gemstone, salt, zinc, gypsum, diatomite, and others. Hydropower also is a natural source for Kenya, Hydroelectricity is the largest contributor of electricity to the nation. Kenya wants to want to have a nuclear plant by the end of 2018. Kenya is well known for topographical variety. The low-lying fertile costal region is fringed with coral reefs and islands. Kenya has an altitude of 5,000 feet. Seasons vary and are distinguished by duration of rainfall rather than changes of temperature.
Kenya also has natural goods such as fossil fuels, coal, oil and natural gas. In December of 2004, Muungano Gold Prospecting group employed an estimated 1,500 miners at six of their small-scale gold mines in Kenya’s Kakamega district, so gold was operation was a valuable operation. Looking into Kenya’s iron and steel production Kenya mined tiny amounts of iron ore for use in their cement operations.
Kenya’s first contact with the European people and the people of Asia came with the “Scramble for Africa” starting in 1885 multiple countries to include British, French, German, Portuguese, Italian, Belgian, and Spanish came to the country of Africa then started to colonize Africa to include the Africa nation of Kenya. During the scramble for Africa there was a process of invasion, occupation, colonization, and annexation of the African territory by European powers during the new Imperialism period, it was between 1881 and World War one in 1914. There was tension between the European states and Africa. David Livingston was one of the early explorer of Africa would explore the nation of Kenya as well. The Portuguese were the first post European middle-age European to firmly establish settlements, trade posts, permanent fortifications, and ports along the oceanic coasts of the African continent to include a substantial portion of Kenya beginning in the 15th century. Arab traders however began frequenting the Kenya coast around the 1st century CE. Kenyans proximity to the Arabian Peninsula invited trade, and later colonization.
Greek and Egyptians traded with the Kenyan’s. The first European to reach Kenya was a Portuguese explorer named Vasco Da Gama, Christianity also brought exposure to Kenya, the first Christian mission was to Kenya was in 1846 led by DR. Johann Ludwig a German. The advent of colonialism in Kenya began in the 1880’s and was part of the general trend of Europeans colonization in Africa that would later be called the Scramble for Africa to which.
Despite British claims to Kenya and Uganda, colonization did not really begin until 1896 when the British began to build the Uganda Railroad. The British had this interest in Kenya and the East was stimulated by the Germans competition. In 1887 the Imperial British East Company leased a 10-mile-wide strip of land along the coast from Seyyid Said. So, it was a majority of the British who really made the first contact with Kenya, they set up colonization all over Kenya and the rest of Africa. The British Railroad company made it all the easier for people to go place to place in Kenya and the rest of Africa as well.
The British put them to work doing hard labor to build farms and the Railroads that the British would use to transport goods. Mission work in Kenya began in in 1846 when Dr. Johann Ludwig Krapf a German sponsored by the church of Missionary society of England (Hallet 5611974) During this time the Kenyan coastline was part of the Zanzibar Sultanate. Sultan Sayyid Said granted Krapf a permit to start missionary stations in Mombasa, where Krapf learned Swahili (ES Church Missionary Society 9 1882) Krapf translated the Bible to Swahili before being forced to return Germany in 1853 due to deteriorating health. This mission was called Project Canterbury. Today in Kenya there are multiple missionary works going on, one is the Kenya missionary network where Presbyterian churches provide a forum to worship together and exchange ideas, culture stories, and much more. Today Korean missionaries are also flocking to the nation of Kenya as well.
The religious groups that are involved in Kenya today are Protestant, Catholic, Presbyterian, Hindu, Judaism, Buddhists, Sikh and others. The missionary groups in Kenya have progressed very well. Many churches in Africa today thrive and Kenya is no exception. There missionaries from pretty much every part of Europe, with the missionaries come medical aid, medicines, clothes, food, school supplies, clinics both dental and medical. Before colonization, Kenya was populated by the Maasai, Kikuyu, and various other tribes. However, after the Berlin Conference of 1885, Great Britain drew political and national boundaries that conflicted with the already existing cultural boundaries. Britain’s colonization of Kenya led to much political strife and cultural shift during the early twentieth century as Kenya sought for its freedom and independence away from the British empire. The Berlin Conference of 1885 divided Africa into several different territories and Great Britain was given the territory of Kenya.
With the new political boundaries, the tribes were now confined within unfamiliar boundaries that constricted their migration patterns and put them under new unfamiliar laws. In 1895, Great Britain created the East African Protectorate that open the plans to settlements by white colonists but restricted where the indigenous people could settle. This favoritism that Britain showed towards its white settlers in allowing them to run for political office and giving them large amounts of fertile land for their sole purpose greatly influenced racial divide that would lead to the protest movement that advocated for independence. It was during the 1940’s that dissention ran through out of the nation with terrible acts of the Mau Mau movement of the 50’s to fight against British rule. Leading members of the Kikuyu, Embu, Meru, and the Kambu tribe met together secretly to fight for Kenya’s independence and started the all-out terrorist attacks on innocent people. The Mau Mau rebellion led the country to be put in a state of emergency from October 1952 to December 1959 as Britain tried its hardest to quell the state of unrest. After much effort the Mau Mau movement quelled but it impacted Britain greatly, so it finally released the colony and gave Kenya their independence in December 1963. About a year after Kenya achieved their independence, Jomo Kenyatta, who was one of the leaders of the Mau Mau rebellion who was imprisoned for several years, became Kenya’s first president and would lead the nation until his death in 1978.
Although Kenya went through much turmoil trying to gain independence from the constricting British rule, they would band together under the new political boundaries and achieve their independence. So, Kenya history changed how Kenya would be today. In conclusion the Nation of Kenya has a rich history in everything from trading to myths to music. Kenya today is a much different nation than 100 years ago.
Kenya would see explorers from France, Germany and the United States. Kenya’s economy continues to grow through their natural resources being their sugarcane, coconuts, cashews, cotton, limestones and gemstones. Iron ore and cooper continue to be a source of their economy. Kenya continues to grow in religion by more missionary work coming to Kenya. Kenya’s independence though was achieved through violence and senseless deaths was still gained. The rebellion was a sign that the people of Kenya would not be subject to being controlled.
Kenya is a beautiful nation with many kinds of animals that contribute to the ecosystem. Kenya will continue to thrive into the future.
