History of Kenya |
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Kenyaportal |
The Kennedy Airlift was started in 1959 by a 28-year-old Kenyan, Tom Mboya, who sought support for promising Kenyan students to get college and university educations in the United States and Canada. It brought hundreds of students from East Africa from 1959 to 1963 and was supported by many North American educational institutions, foundations, and individuals such as the African American Students Foundation (AASF) and African Americans including Harry Belafonte, Jackie Robinson, Sidney Poitier, and Martin Luther King Jr. It got its popular nickname in September 1960 when Senator John F. Kennedy in a close presidential campaign arranged a $100,000 donation from the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr Foundation to cover airfare for the autumn 1960 group of East African students just as the program was running out of funds. [1]
The program began in earnest in 1959, when Tom Mboya embarked on a speaking tour of the United States to seek scholarships for students from East Africa. The first batch of 81 students touched down in New York City on September 11, 1959. They would be settled in various universities in the United States and Canada. In Kenya, Mboya liaised with Julius Kiano and Kariuki Njiiri to identify potential students for the airlifts. Both Kiano and Njiiri were alumni of US universities. [2] [3]
The airlifts were opposed by Britain, which did not want American meddling with any of its colonies, one of which was Kenya. British officials spread propaganda among top Kenyan students that American education was inferior to British education.
The airlifts officially ended in 1963. Most of the graduates from American and Canadian colleges and universities went back to help build the newly-independent Kenya. Some were employed even before they had graduated, mainly in the public administration sector as district and provincial officers. Men found it easy to get jobs for which they qualified, but women faced a tougher challenge since they were offered secretarial duties despite being better qualified than most male officers in the same departments. However, the inclusion of women demonstrated foresight on the part of the airlift organizers. One of these women, Wangari Maathai, later won the Nobel Peace Prize, and another, Leah Marangu, later become the first female head of a university in Africa. [4]
Overall, the accomplishments of the airlift students were significant. Several of them became the entrepreneurs, cabinet ministers, members
Over 800 students, mainly from Kenya, benefited from the Kennedy Airlift. Notable recipients include Kenya's Wangari Maathai, the first African female and first environmentalist to win the Nobel Prize; Mahmoud Mamdani, a prominent Ugandan academic listed in the top 100 list of public intellectuals by Prospect Magazine ; and George Saitoti, a former vice president of Kenya. Other notable recipients include [3] [4] [5] [6] [7]
Contrary to some media reports, Barack Obama Sr., the first husband of Stanley Ann Dunham and father of Barack Obama II, was not a direct beneficiary of the airlifts [8] but, inspired by the airlift program, applied to various American universities and received private funding to attend the University of Hawaii. He also received funding from the African American Students Foundation (AASF) with the help of Mboya and so was part of the airlift generation. [4]
Wangarĩ Muta Maathai was a Kenyan social, environmental, and political activist who founded the Green Belt Movement, an environmental non-governmental organization focused on the planting of trees, environmental conservation, and women's rights. In 2004 she became the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize.
Murang'a County is one of the counties of Kenya's former Central Province. Its largest town and capital is Murang'a, which was referred to as Fort Hall during the colonial era. The county is inhabited mainly by and is considered the birthplace of the Gikuyu, the largest ethnic group in Kenya. The county has a population of 1,056,640 based on the 2019 census.
Thomas Joseph Odhiambo Mboya was a Kenyan trade unionist, educator, Pan-Africanist, author, independence activist, and statesman. He was one of the founding fathers of the Republic of Kenya. He led the negotiations for independence at the Lancaster House Conferences and was instrumental in the formation of Kenya's independence party – the Kenya African National Union (KANU) – where he served as its first Secretary-General. He laid the foundation for Kenya's capitalist and mixed economy policies at the height of the Cold War and set up several of the country's key labour institutions. Mboya was Minister for Economic Planning and Development when he was assassinated.
The University of Nairobi is a collegiate research university based in Nairobi and is the largest university in Kenya. Although its history as an educational institution dates back to 1956, it did not become an independent university until 1970. During that year, the University of East Africa was split into three independent universities: the Makerere University in Uganda, the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, and the University of Nairobi in Kenya.
George Musengi Saitoti, E.G.H. was a Kenyan politician, businessman and American- and British-trained economist, mathematician and development policy thinker.
Mang'u High School is a Kenyan Roman Catholic National High School established in 1925, located in Kiambu County along the Nairobi-Thika Highway six kilometres (3.7 mi) from Thika, Kenya. Mang'u High School is ranked among the top schools nationwide in Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education and has many eminent alumni including one Kenyan president, several vice presidents, a Central Bank of Kenya governor and a former Cardinal.
Nobelity is a feature documentary which looks at the world's most pressing problems through the eyes of Nobel laureates, including Desmond Tutu, Sir Joseph Rotblat, Ahmed Zewail and Wangari Maathai.
Karura Forest is an urban forest in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. The forest was gazetted in 1932 and is managed by the Kenya Forest Service in conjunction with the Friends of Karura Forest Community Forest Association.
Mahmood Mamdani, FBA is an Indian-born Ugandan academic, author, and political commentator. He currently serves as the Chancellor of Kampala International University, Uganda. He was the director of the Makerere Institute of Social Research (MISR) from 2010 until February 2022, the Herbert Lehman Professor of Government at the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University and the Professor of Anthropology, Political Science and African Studies at Columbia University.
Wilson Ndolo Ayah was a Kenyan politician. He served as Foreign Minister from 1990 to 1993 during Kenya's return to a multi-party system of governance. Wilson Ndolo Ayah served in the government of Daniel Arap Moi as minister from 18 August 1987 when he was first appointed Minister for Research Science and Technology. He was also a beneficiary of the Kennedy Airlifts.
Helen Marguerite (Emery) Roberts was an American writer, photographer, and multilingual educator. From 1958 to 1975, she battled illiteracy in Africa, teaching reading, writing, health and Christian religion to thousands of illiterate adults. In the course of her African work, she mentored and sponsored many promising young Africans, encouraging them to pursue higher education, including Barack H. Obama, the father of President of the United States Barack Obama.
Susan Mboya is a corporate executive and philanthropist who is the Principal and International Advisor for Navigators Global a Washington DC based consulting firm. Susan has been a corporate executive for over 25 years and has held a number of senior executive positions at global multinational firms. Susan was the Global Director for Oral B Oral Care at Procter and Gamble for 5 years and was the General Manager of Coca-Cola South Africa from 2008 to 2011. Susan is the immediate former President of the Coca-Cola Africa Foundation and the group director of the Eurasia Africa Group (EAG) for women’s economic empowerment at Coca-Cola. and is the daughter of the late Tom Mboya, a Kenyan nationalist leader, and one of the founding fathers of the Republic of Kenya and the late Pamela Mboya, a renowned diplomat who was Kenya’s representative to UN Habitat. Tom Mboya was a well-known trade unionist, educationist, Pan Africanist, author, and a Cabinet Minister in Kenyas first post-independence Government. She is also the former First Lady of Nairobi County, Kenya's largest county and the capital city and economic centre of Kenya. Susan holds a number of board positions including the Chair of Liberty Group, a publicly traded company in the nairobi stock exchange. Susan is the Founder of the Zawadi Africa Educational Fund, a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that provides scholarships and leadership development training to academically gifted, marginalized African girls to enable them to attend top colleges and universities around the world with the objective of creating a pipeline of African female leaders. The Zawadi Africa program is based on the Africa Student Airlifts program launched by her father and President John F. Kennedy in 1959 that enabled several participants including Barack Obama Sr, father of President Barack Obama, and Professor Wangari Mathaai to study in the U.S.
Professor Reuben James Olembo (1937–2005) was a prominent Kenyan academic, scientist and environmentalist. He was a deputy executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), which he played a pivotal role in helping found, and United Nations Assistant Secretary General from 1994 to 1998. He became the Acting Secretary General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), after his retirement from UNEP.
Pamela Mboya was a Kenyan political activist and diplomat, the wife of Tom Mboya the Kenyan trade unionist, educationist, Pan Africanist, author, independence activist, Cabinet Minister and one of the founding fathers of the Republic of Kenya.
Eric Edward Khasakhala, known as "Omwana wa Kwendo" was a Kenyan politician, educationist, Pan Africanist, independence activist, Cabinet Minister and one of the founding fathers of the Republic of Kenya. He was a participant of the delegation at the negotiations for Independence at the Lancaster House Conferences; he was instrumental in the formation of Kenya's Kenya African Democratic Union (KADU) party, which he served as one of the party officers. The KADU advocated for the federalist post independent Kenya.
This is a timeline of the History of Kenya comprising important legal and territorial changes as well as political, social, and economic events in Kenya, read more at History of Kenya.
Washington Aggrey Jalang'o Okumu was a Kenyan diplomat, politician, academic and author, who rose to fame as the mediator that convinced the Inkatha Freedom Party's leader, Mangosuthu Buthelezi, to be part of South Africa's democratic elections in 1994, thereby ensuring a peaceful transition for South Africa's politics. He is also the author of two books: 'Lumumba's Congo: Roots of Conflict' published in 1962 and 'The African Renaissance: History, Significance and Strategy' published in 2002.
Ochola Ogaye Mak'Anyengo, also known as George Philip Ochola (1930–1990) was a Kenyan trade unionist and Member of Parliament for Ndhiwa, South Nyanza, Kenya. He was involved in the fight for Kenya's independence and was a beneficiary of the Mboya-Kennedy airlifts.
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