ABSTRACT
In pre-colonial Kenya, the peasants in the various nationalities cleared forests, planted crops, tended them to ripeness and harvest – out of the one seed buried in the ground came many seeds. Both the missionaries and the colonial administration used the school system to destroy the concept of the 'empty space' among the people by trying to capture and confine it in government-supervised urban community halls, school halls, church-buildings, and in actual theatre buildings with the proscenium stage. The play Ngaahika Ndeenda showed how that independence, for which thousands of Kenyans died, had been hijacked. In other words, it showed the transition of Kenya from a colony with the British being dominant, to a neo-colony with doors open to wider imperialist interests from Japan to America. The play was celebrating that history while showing the unity and continuity of that struggle.
