KENYA, THE LAND OF MYTHS

Hokitika Guardian, 14 January 1929, Page 8

KENYA, THE LAND OF MYTHS

WHITE SETTLERS: RIDDLE THAT LACKS AN ANSWER: (By Sir Percival Phillips.) ELDORET. Kenya Highlands. Nov. 29. A good many myths concerning this colony of Kenya appear to be current in Great Britain. It is believed, for example that most of the wild beasts of Africa roam at will within a stone’s throw’ of Nairobi and that the passage of the mail train from Mombasa through the big-game reserve evokes on more than a bored glance from the rhinooerous feeding alongside the line. There is another delusion that Kenya is a convenient dumping ground for the wastrel sons of irreconcilable lathers and the residue of London’s night clubs. To this must be added the fond conviction of mismarried couples that Nairobi is a snug refuge for runaway wives and Mnmbassa a secret port ot missing men.

The very words “Happy Valley” seem to'them to conjure up a delightful picture of illicit bliss in an unpoliced Garden of Eden, where “soul mates” are easily interchangeable. Then there Is the equally inaccurate vision of Kenya as a land of plenty for the dilettante farmer who wishes to mix sport and sisal in unequal quantities and reap a harvest of sterling. The collection of fantasies would be complete without the inclusion of the comparatively new growth on the credulity of mankind, which is the fixed idea that the tropical highlands await will’ open arms the poor farmer lacking capital and farming experience.

NO ROOM FOR WASTERS. Kenya is not benefited by tbe circulation of such fairy tales. The plain truth is sufficient for her progress and development. She needs no romantic giamour or cheap publicity based on sensensational gossip for the identification of the untravelled children of the Empire. Big game is distinctively shy of civilisation and elephants no longer toss their trunks in the direction of the down night express. Imported wasters are as unwelcome here as in London and the path of the adventurer is ham novo ml belief. Corespondents find that the ostrich with its head in the sand is less conspicuous than their private affairs. The runaway wife in search of Lotusland and privacy is denied both and even the length of her lipstick is known from Eldorct t- .Tii'bi. The amateur farmer finds tlint sisal over-diluted with sport is a deadly crop at all reasons. Most important of all w the poor man who is hired here to carve out a competence with a few shillings and his two hands is doomed to tragic disappointment. The day has not yet come when the ordinary immigrant, however willing he may be, can hope to establish himself without capital in this rich land but capricious land. Kenya is too newly risen from the bush and too immature to enfold the unemployed of Great Britain of her bosom.

WONDERFUL PROGRESS. And yet she is a colony of amazing promise. You have only to look at the record of her development since the war to realise that. Exports of her agricultural staples have gone up by leaps and bounds; She is self-support-ing in sugar and three years more will, it is believed, see her self-supporting in tea. Coffee, cotton, maize, and sisal have gone forth from her seaboard in steadily increasing vonime.

Her communities have grown in size and solidity Nairobi is a moving picture of shop and house construction. The railway has reached a high state ot efficiency. A new Government House testifies to the importance of a greater bureaucracy.

11 this is very wonderful, but it d” not mean that Kenya lias reached the same, plane as older portions ol the Empire. Caution is essential at this time more than ever before in stepping towards the future. In no line of progress is it more needed than in the field of colonisation.

On this subject, us on many others hound up with the development ot Kenya, I have, found a liewildcring conflict of opinion. Nowhere else in the outlying portions of the Empire where white settlers are needed are so many opposing theories thrust at the newcomer with passionate earnestness. Minds clash over what appear to lie the most elementary facts. This man tells you authoritatively that any attempt to people Kenya with “poor whites” who are unable to “go home' every two of three years is a crime against humanity. That , one retorts just as heartily that a new Kenya-bred generation will be as sound as any horn on the soil of England. The third says that either of the first two may hr right, hut that we arc justified in any case in experimenting with the sun and altitude in the interests of Empire, even if the result should prove to he a generation gone to seed.

WILDERNESS OF ARGUMENT. On such a tour in the wilderness of argument you are likely to meet men who soe.ni desirous of keeping Kenya merely as a playground for the leisured classes. Others prefer a kind of feudal system of first families with themselves at the head such as existed in tlie southern colonies of America in the 18th. century, supported by a lower strata of industrious and subservient whites and a broad foundation of black labour.

Still others dream of a federated, self-governing East African State, fre' from what they term "the shackles of

Whitehall” and akin in aim and spirit to Canada. New Zealand, and Australia. A few would grapple with the problem of colonisation Gy first having the ricn reserves of land now alienated to the native placed at their disposal for the present-day equivalent of coloured beads and a looking glass. They are looking for a substantial “turnover” at the expense of the raw immigrant in search of a farm.

At the bottom of other theories may he discerned political ambition or the belief that, the future of Kenya should be left wholly in the hands of the patriarchs who call themselves “the original settlers.”

With such confusion of thought at the fountain' head of knowledge it is not to be wondered at that certain distorted views prevail in Great Britain concerning the possibilities and attractions of a life on the land. The problem of settlement, in Kenya is one peculiar to this environment. The conditions of Kenya are not to be found in any other part of the Empire. Therefore when the subject is approached all the pros and cons as set forth by the various schools of thought should be considered carefully. Kenya needs white settlers. That much is conceded by all factions. But of what kind aid in what numbers, is a riddle that is yet without a satisfactory answer.

Government is trying to find one, and it is called “the settlement scheme.”