Self-mythologization in East African Political Writings: Kenyatta, Nyerere and Museveni

Abstract

ABSTRACTA particular kind of debate has been raising dust, especially after what seems largely as the inability of the first independent African leaders to put an end to the unholy trio of poverty, illiteracy and disease, and thus to open the gates to all-round development in their countries. This paper is a continuation of this debate. It aims to account – in yet another way, besides ways that have already been offered – for the stubborn reality of largely unfulfilled aspirations of the anti-colonial struggle in Africa, and East Africa in particular; to interrogate how the leaders use literature to absolve themselves of all the postcolonial blame, in a way sanitizing their political record. The paper specifically uses lit-crit methodology to examine Jomo Kenyatta’s Suffering Without Bitterness, Julius Nyerere’s Freedom and Unity/Uhuru na Umoja and Yoweri Museveni’s Sowing the Mustard Seed to demonstrate how, in this literature, they employ specific literary strategies to construct their own identities. The paper interrogates the rhetorical strategies through which the figures in question attempted to build a mystique around their administrations and, more specifically, their own persons. The argument progressed in this paper is that these leaders used these literary strategies to construct images of a father of the nation, of a Machiavellian sort (Kenyatta), a Saintly Mwalimu (Nyerere) and a revolutionary of a Che Guevara stature (Museveni).