Elijah Masinde ( 1910/1912-1987) was a
Bukusu
The Bukusu people ( Bukusu: ''Babukusu'') are one of the seventeen Kenyan tribes of the Luhya Bantu people of East Africa residing mainly in the counties of Bungoma and Trans Nzoia. They are closely related to other Luhya people and the Gisu ...
activist.
Early life
Born around 1910 – 1912 in
Kimilili,
Bungoma District, Masinde wa Nameme okhwa Mwasame was initiated into the Machego age-set. At the time, the Kenya-Uganda railway was passing through Ababukusu land. He began to practice football at a young age, eventually starting out as a
footballer
A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...
and captaining a football team from Kimilili. He also played for the
Kenyan national team in the
Gossage Cup against
Uganda
}), is a landlocked country in East Africa
East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territor ...
in 1930. By the early 1940s, he had risen to the rank of a junior elder within his community in Kimilili area, and become increasingly anti-colonial. In 1944, he led a number of localised defiance campaigns against the colonial authorities, and was imprisoned many times as a result. At one time he was put in Mathare Mental Hospital and detained in Lamu.
Detention, old age, and death
Upon Kenya's independence, Masinde was detained by the government of
Jomo Kenyatta
Jomo Kenyatta (22 August 1978) was a Kenyan anti-colonial activist and politician who governed Kenya as its Prime Minister from 1963 to 1964 and then as its first President from 1964 to his death in 1978. He was the country's first indigenous ...
for almost 15 years. He was accused of fomenting religious hatred. He was released by the government of
Daniel arap Moi in 1978, however, Moi also arrested him following his clashes with traffic policemen in Webuye and Kitale. Elija Masinde remained defiant and continually questioned post independence Kenya's government, especially on the issue of land distribution and citizen rights. He died in 1987, considered a neglected freedom fighter.
Before his death, Masinde said that one of his relatives had bewitched him. He also described to his elder son where he wanted to be buried: he wanted a huge sycamore tree uprooted to make way for his grave. The family decided to bury him elsewhere, though, but the spot they chose for his grave turned out to be someone else's hidden grave. They took this to be an omen and proceeded to bury him in the spot where the sycamore tree had been.
He left a widow, Sarah Nanyama Masinde. She was still alive in November 2007 and was then reportedly 105 years old.
[Daily Nation, 12 November 2007]
Masinde family supports Raila
/ref>
See also
* Dini Ya Msambwa
References
*Makila, F. E. (1978) ''An Outline History of Babukusu of Western Kenya.'' Nairobi, Kenya: Kenya Literature Bureau.
*Alembi, Ezekiel. (2000) Elijah Masinde: Rebel with a cause''. Nairobi, Kenya: Sasa Sema Publications Ltd.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Masinde, Elijah
Kenyan rebels
Kenyan footballers
Association footballers not categorized by position
1910s births
1987 deaths