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Tom Mboya
Photograph via Wikimedia Commons
Statecraft & Independence Landmark

Tom Mboya

1930 – 1969

Founding secretary general of KANU and the architect of the airlift to America

Landmark is level 2 of 4 in the Kenya Hall of Fame: a first that opened a door, or the pre-eminent figure of their generation in this country. See how the levels work.

Why they are here

He built one of the strongest trade union movements in Africa and turned it into an instrument of independence, then organised the airlift that sent a generation of Kenyans to American universities.

Tom Mboya was a founder of the Kenya African National Union in 1960 and its first secretary general, and led the Kenya Independence Movement with Oginga Odinga.

He built one of the most effective trade union movements on the continent and used it as a tool for independence. He was assassinated in Nairobi in 1969.
Sources

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