TOM MBOYA TRAINED HIS ASSASSIN,...R.I.P

Celebrating my HERO, the Charismatic Pan-africanist, Freedom Fighter and the Greatest President Kenya Never had, Thomas Joseph Stanley Mboya.

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Few people have heard of Bulgaria’s Vasil Levski Higher Military Academy. Now, that is where Tom Mboya’s killer, Nahashon Isaac Njenga, received his training as a sapper.

Military Sappers are hardened frontline soldiers who dig trenches, spy, demolish bridges and clear the way. Interestingly, Mboya was instrumental in the training of his former youth-winger-turned-killer.

Why then did a man that Mboya trusted turn into his killer? That is the question that has never been answered some 49 years after the former minister for Economic Planning was killed.

For four years, Njenga was a student in this high-profile academy named after a Bulgarian revolutionary who led an armed uprising of all Bulgarians during the Ottoman Empire. His diploma certificates indicated that he was trained in internal combustion engines, military techniques and firing preparations.

What was not known is that Njenga was part of a group that was being trained to return and join the military but the British — who were financing the Kenya armed forces — objected the entry of Communist-trained soldiers into the military.

Most of those affected were students sent at the behest of Jaramogi Oginga Odinga whose links with the Reds were public knowledge. President Jomo Kenyatta’s inner circle was also known to send Kanu youth wingers for training in Bulgaria and Mboya and his ally in Kanu, Kariuki Njiiri, the party’s Education and Publicity Secretary, were known to shortchange one another on the scholarships.

After independence, some of the politicos in Kanu wanted to send their own for either intelligence or military training abroad. While some of these graduates ended up in government, others were locked out.

While the US airlifts organised by Mboya and US-trained Dr Julius Gikonyo Kiano were orderly, the Bulgarian airlifts were chaotic.

So bad was the situation that on the morning of November 6, 1963, the new Education minister, Joseph Otiende, wrote to Kenyatta and the entire Cabinet demanding “to know how many governments exist in this country... if there are any subversion being planned, then we must be aware of what is happening”.

Interestingly, nobody answered Mr Otiende’s fears.

ATTENDING FOREIGN COURSES

While the Cabinet had decided that the Kenya Overseas Scholarship Advisory Committee (KOSAC) would choose those attending foreign courses — this was not to be when it came to Bulgaria scholarships.

Njenga was part of a controversial group of Kanu youth wingers that had been picked by Mboya, Odinga and Njiiri to take up training courses in Bulgaria.

On that day, at 10.30pm, Otiende had arrived at the Nairobi Airport from a meeting in Dar es Salaam. At the airport were officials from his ministry eager to welcome him back and update him on the scheduled airlift of 55 students who had been selected by the ministry for further studies in Bulgaria.

Officially, Otiende was to see them off and he had made arrangements with the Bulgarian embassy in Ethiopia, which had sent an Ilyushin aircraft to airlift the students.

But as Otiende left his plane, an official from his ministry called him aside and told him that “there was another list (of students) being prepared by Kanu giving the names of students selected (for the Bulgarian scholarships).” They were to leave the next morning.

Otiende, according to archival letters, was shocked and after a few calls to senior ministry officials he left the airport, just past midnight, and drove to the home of Dawson Mwanyumba, minister for Works, Communications and Power, and requested him to “hold the Bulgarian plane until the Cabinet sorted out the matter”.

Unknown to Otiende, five Cabinet ministers Mboya (Justice and Constitutional Affairs), Kiano (Commerce and Industry), Dr Njoroge Mungai (Health and Housing) and Koinange (Pan-African Affairs) had secretly schemed to have a different set of students travel to Bulgaria. Odinga, who had been instrumental in negotiating the scholarships, was told by Mboya that Kenyatta had approved the new list. It was perhaps a lie.

Although Otiende was “in touch” with the Bulgarian government and had on September 12 received a letter saying the total number of scholarships “was mentioned to Hon Odinga when His Excellency passed through here (Addis Ababa) on his journey to Accra” he did not smell a rat. After all, he was in charge of the ministry of Education, or so he thought.

November 6, the day Otiende’s students were to leave, another group was on its way to the airport led by Njiiri and the Lands and Settlement minister, Jackson Angaine, who was to accompany them to Sofia, the Bulgarian capital.

Details on the flight show that this group elbowed past the Otiende group and went to the aircraft accompanied by Mr Odinga. He ordered the plane to leave with the students at 5am. That overruled an earlier order by Mwanyumba, the minister for Works, Communications and Power, who had called the airport early that morning and ordered the plane to be detained until the next morning.

Mwanyumba and Otiende were not even aware that Kenyatta was to receive a party of Bulgarian officials led by the Director of African affairs, G. Tanev, who had been writing letters to Otiende about the airlift. Tanev had arranged to meet Mr Odinga, too.

ACQUIRED DRIVING LICENCE

Whether Njenga was on Odinga or Mboya’s group has never been known but it was through this scholarship that he landed in Veliko Turnovo town, a picturesque medieval city whose history dates back to more than 5,000 years ago.

Njenga immersed himself into the Bulgarian life, acquired a driving licence and would be taken many photos in his military attire. These would later feature in his court case.
______Part II coming shortly______