Global histories of anti-colonial rebellion are laden with male leaders. Across Africa, leaders such as Kwame Nkrumah, Patrice Lumumba and Jomo Kenyatta steered resistance against their colonial overlords in Ghana, Congo and Kenya. Thankfully, recently the contribution of women within such movements has also emerged from the shadows of history. Mekatilili wa Menza is one such activist who deserves recognition for her anti-colonial defiance in Kenya.
Believed to have been born in the 1840s in Kilifi County, Mekatilili wa Menza became politically active between 1912 and 1915, leading the Giriama people against British colonial forces.
[1] Most of Mekatilili’s activism therefore began when she was in her seventies. Around that time, the British authorities began to increase economic pressures on the Giriama people by implementing ‘hut taxes’ and by attempting to control the palm wine and ivory trade. They also attempted to recruit as workforce young Giriama men, taking the