Kenya: Political Parties Material
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- Creator
- Institute of Commonwealth Studies
TitleKenya: Political Parties Material
Reference codePP.KE
Date1946-
Scope and ContentManifestos, speeches, pamphlets, leaflets, letters, newsletters, journals, posters and miscellaneous election material issued by the Capricorn Africa Society, the Democratic Party of Kenya, the European Elected Members' Organization, the Electors' Union (Kenya), the Forum for the Restoration of Democracy-Kenya, the Independent Group of Members of Legislative Council (Kenya), the Kenya African Democratic Union, the Kenya African National Union, the Kenya Coalition, the Kenya Empire Party, the Kenya Indian Congress, the Kenya Party, the Kenya People's Union, Muungano wa Wazalendo Wa Kukomboa Kenya, the New Kenya Party, the Northern Province People's Progressive Party (Kenya), the Progressive Local Government Party (Kenya), the Reform Party (Kenya), UKENYA, the Voice of Kenya and a variety of independent candidates.
NotesThe majority of materials in the collection here date from the period between the founding of the first pan-Kenyan nationalist movement in 1944 and the the granting of independence in 1963 following the election victory of Jomo Kenyatta's Kenya African National Union (KANU). Both the major African and colonialist parties are represented, with the issues covered including the proposed East African Federation, the border dispute with Somalia and of course the Mau Mau uprising of 1952-1960. Of particular interest is the debate concerning the future constitution of the country as it became clear that the days of rule from Britain were numbered. The predominantly white parties hoped to secure the representation of minorities in government, while the Kenya African Democratic Union (KADU) promoted a federal structure in the hope that this would prevent the strongly Kikuyu KANU from using their likely control of central government to dominate other tribal groupings. A smaller number of items also cover Kenya's consolidation as a pro-Western one-party state after 1963 and the opposition first to Kenyetta and later to his successor Daniel Arap Moi.
Conditions governing accessAccess to this collection is unrestricted for the purpose of private study and personal research within the supervised environment of the library.
Extent3 boxes
System of ArrangementAlphabetically by party, and then in rough chronological order.
Finding aidsItem-level descriptions are available on the library catalogue: http://catalogue.ulrls.lon.ac.uk/search~S17/
Related files
See also Kenya: Pressure Groups and Trades Unions Material (PG.KE), and Political Party, Trades Unions and Pressure Group Materials for other Commonwealth countries and material in the Institute of Commonwealth Studies library's main classified sequence.
Level of descriptionfonds