The family of Koitalel Arap Samoei, a Kenyan freedom warrior, is requesting that the British government return Koitalel’s head to them.
The family gathered on Monday in Nandi Hills (Koitalel mausoleum) while the funeral procession for British queen Queen Elizabeth II went on in London, led by Ambrose Tarus, Koitalel Samoei’s great-grandson.
They insisted that Koitalel’s head, which they claim was taken as a war trophy during the struggle for Kenya’s independence, be returned by the UK government.
The family also demanded that the British government publicly apologize to the Nandi community and the impacted families. Additionally, they claimed Ksh.150 billion in compensation for the losses sustained as a result of the confiscated property.
On October 19, 1905, British Col. Richard Meinertzhagen shot and killed Koitalel, the leader of an eleven-year resistance effort opposing the construction of the Uganda Railway through the Nandi region.
In order to exploit Koitalel as a pawn in the deadly ambush, Meinertzhagen had summoned him to discuss a peace.
The body was severed from its head, which the colonists transported to London.
At the Nandi Hills Town, where the Nandi leader’s decapitated body was discovered, a symbolic cemetery was constructed. His head is missing, as evidenced by the marble grave’s design.
In a startling admission on June 6, 2013, former British Foreign Secretary William Hague acknowledged that colonial forces had tortured Kenyans who had rebelled against British authority in the 1950s.
Pre-independence, 12,000 Africans perished.
