The witnesses attempted to show the existence of false testimonies in all
of these cases, so additional interrogation should have taken place. But this did
not happen in the hearing. The bottom line was that the life or death of the
accused was based on witness identification and supporting oathing details.
Unfortunately, the accused may not have understood the laws and conditions
that served as the foundation for their crimes, “the administration and being
present during the oathing”. With this in mind, the accused should have spent
more time providing evidence that they were not present on October 27, 1953 at
the oathing ceremony. However, the courts appeared to judge them based on
their inability to provide evidence of what they were doing if they were not
actually involved in Mau Mau oathing activities. Calendar accounts and tracking
are not culturally attended to as they are in Western culture. Therefore, it may
have been difficult for the accused to vividly remember what they were actually
doing on the day in question if they indeed were not present in the oathing
ceremonies. But, this speaks to one of the cultural problems with the judicial
system imposed by the colonial government. If justice is the desired outcome,
then it can only be achieved by working within the cultural framework of the
people to understand how they process and interpret events and how justice was
historically rooted in their society.
137