the Mau Mau oath curse, or was it associated with a lack of familiarity with the
Supreme Court process? Were contestations lost or erased? The alibi
statements of the accused were not carefully analyzed and supported via
witnesses. Their cases were not thoroughly presented making one question the
administration of colonial justice. Sally Falk Moore firmly holds that “the practice
of law by lawyers is by and large an exercise in the manipulation of ‘the
system’.”99 Did they truly have legal representation? Was the system being
manipulated to convict and execute? It is important to question if the cases were
truly a part of a larger colonial policing effort beyond the control of the
defendants. Unfortunately, there are many questions that the files refuse to
answer. However, history has revealed that the British government went to great
lengths to control the image and conversations on Mau Mau and its oathing
tactics. The story that unfolded in these case files were an extension of this
Western dominated view that is far from ending.
Conclusion
During the hysteria of the Mau Mau period, the administration transformed the
oath creating a new criminal relationship that did not exist prior to the 1950s. The
laws against the Mau Mau oath were not justifiable based on the long-standing
interactions of Kenyans with the practice of oath taking; however, during the Mau
Mau war it became a space for establishing colonial authority and dominance in
Kenya. This forged and invented relationship by the authorities was an example
of how the law was manipulated to support colonial interests. Although the law in
99 Moore, Law as a Process, 1.
148