The name is absent

that the “fight was then carried into the forest.”²⁸ However, he is clear to state the
struggle was not in isolation since other groups also claim to have brought
freedom to Kenya (i.e. KAU, and KCA). Itote states that all of the different voices
that claimed they brought freedom to Kenya “speak the truth...the struggle for
freedom was like a vehicle and a vehicle cannot go without a body, an engine
and a driver.”²⁹ In many ways, this statement is a nice summary of the
interdependent components of Mau Mau even though some often treat them as
separate and distinct parts. They are all responses directed at the same desire -
to restore freedom to Kenya.

Despite Itote’s perspective as an insider and his aim to show how freedom
was achieved, there is only a limited discussion of the Mau Mau oath, largely an
outline of oathing statements conducted in 1954.³° He does not go into the same
level of detail of the oath as other inside writers do.

Itote also spends time outlining the accounts of the oathing practices of
the government under his section, “The Government Oath.” Under this heading,
Itote explains how the government worked to establish a policy for cleansing the
oaths and deterring future oathing. It was viewed as a “cleansing ceremony by
the witch-doctor to wash away the Mau Mau oath.”³¹ It is interesting that Itote
prefers to discuss the Mau Mau oath from the perspective of the government
response instead of from the angle of what the Mau Mau oath meant to the
freedom fighters and the overall role it played in the movement.

²⁸ Itote, Mau Mau in Action, 5.

²⁹ Itote, Mau Mau in Action, 1.

³⁰ Itote, Mau Mau in Action, 168-172.

³' Itote, Mau Mau in Action, 72.

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