Oath Perspectives of the 1990s
Wunyabari Maloba in Mau Mau and Kenya wrote in 1993 about the
economic factors associated with Mau Mau through the perspective of peasant-
based revolts. The bulk of his analysis on oathing occurs in chapter five,
“Propaganda and the Oaths.” In this chapter, Maloba focuses on the
criminalization of the Mau Mau oath in particular and links this with the colonial
government’s propaganda campaigns. In his treatment of oathing, he identifies
three stages (or types) of oathing: unity, batuni, and advanced. The first types
were consistent with other scholars; however the “advanced” oath that surfaced
after 1953 was something new which was viewed by him as an oath that went
beyond the batuni.45 Although the initial Mau Mau oath writers never discussed
advanced oaths, Maloba alludes that these oaths were not mentioned because of
the controversy surrounding the sexual symbolism in the oaths; he states through
interrogation and confessions the details of these oaths were leaked out to the
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press.
According to Maloba, the Mau Mau oath was eventually categorized by
the press as the “foul oaths and barbarism of Mau Mau.”48 Maloba attempts to
deal with the complexity of the oaths through his analysis of the varied oath types
and through general ceremonial descriptions. For example, he provides an
overview to an oath ceremony with the following statement:
“The ceremony itself was conducted under the cover of darkness in a hut by a
designated oath administrator who was helped and protected by several
46 Wunyabari Matoba, Маи Май and Kenya, An Analysis of a Peasant Revolt (Bloomington: Indiana
UniversityPress, 1993), 102.
47 Maloba, Mau Mau and Kenya, 105.
48 Maloba, Mau Mau and Kenya, 105.
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