Afrikaners Presence in Uasin Gishu

 By William Kiptoo

 (Compiled from various sources)

In February 1903: Three brothers (Van Brenda) from South Africa arrived in Uasin Gishu. They made their selections of land around Sergoit Rock. Each obtained ten thousand acres of land.

The van Bredas remained the sole white inhabitants of the Uasin Gishu plateau until John de Waal (who had moved from Lake Nakuru), the Arnoldi and Styn family all Afrikaners, arrived in 1905. The eldest of the Van Breda brothers was later ambushed by the Keiyo and his ear almost severed by a simi (knobkerrie) when returning to his house from a walk.

1906: The largest single South African group (they were 300 from South Africa, but 47 arrived in Uasin Gishu) led by Jan Van Rensburg; a prominent Transvaal farmer moved to Uasin Gishu. They were allocated 60,000 acres block of unsurveyed land in Moiben Plateu by the Van Brenda brothers. They had been told of the fertility and emptiness of land in Uasin Gishu plateau which was about to be allocated to European farmers. The treatment the natives harshly.

In 1910 the Uasin Gishu Farmers Association (UNGA) was formed. In March 1911 they gathered at Sergoit and elected Major Parker Toulson, a retired army officer as their President of UNGA. Their economic development was restrained—crop failures, loss of land and bywoner status held them back or forced many to leave, though others came up from the south in a steady trickle. C.J. Cloete's party of 60 travelled in 1911 with their Afrikander cattle, horses and merino sheep to 'Farm 64' and named Eldoret. CIoete, paid £4,500 for his farm, and 34 of Ule 50 horses they brought (one a racehorse) were his. He became a community leader and, as was A.F. Arnoldi, an effective spokesman for Afrikaners on settler boards and committees.

1911: One of Van Breda brothers was murdered by Arap Chemorna and Arap Saiwa. Arap Saiwa had gone to the Bwana' s house and told him to come with him to extract some honey from a tree. Bwana Breda followed and not far from the house Arap Chemorna was in the hiding, and as the Van Brenda passed, he speared him. Arap Chemorna and Arap Sawe fled to Marakwet. Van Breda brothers abandoned their holdings (land) due to thefts and continual hostility from the Keiyo and left for South Africa.

The same year, the British colonial administration retaliated against the Keiyo and Marakwet and sent an expedition under Lt. Llyod Jones I from Koopke. Arap Chemorna was captured and taken to Mombasa and killed.

In 1918/1919: Famine hit Uasin Gishu and many farmers suffered losses

In 1919 the Keiyo of Koopke, led by Chesire Kibelion arap Omonei, supported by Singore warriors, raided cattle belonging to European farmers at Mekenya and Kapchorua farms.

Cloete’ death during the First World War and Arnoldi's (on active service, contributed' to the wilthdrawal of the Afrikaners from colony's affairs.

In 1920 the decline of Afrikaners as a community in Kenya began due to their rigid anti-integration stance. Rev M.P. Loubser, a Dutch Reformed Church minister whose flock almost continuously steady until from 1919 until his death in the mid-1930s, championed the singe use of Afrikaner language in worship. He glorified it and was determined to preserve their language to “keep themselves spiritually and ethnically pure.” His influence spread far beyond Eldoret and the other places where his flock had settled, like Laikipia and Thompson's Falls, where Van Riebeeck School Afrikaner language was used in Schools.

Afrikaner chauvinism contained, from 1920s, was extreme. They treated their African workers badly and their aloofness towards the British, other European and Asian communities was damaging to the Afrikaners' social development and with few exceptions who kept out of the colony's affairs. They also claimed that they destined to rule Africa, and their language would outlive all others. Religious messianism was common and the view pervasive that they were a chosen people, whose duty was to bring light of Christianity to all the heathens.

It was not until 1944 that a mission to the Africans was established in Eldoret, and somewhat insensitively named 'Bwana Loubser Sending [Mission]'. Time and change brought a small degree of integration in war years and in 1950s