Successor Kenya African Union Extinction Proscribed in 1940 Location Central Kenya | Formation 1927 Type Political Association | |
Predecessor East African Association | ||
The Kikuyu Central Association (KCA), led by James Beauttah and Joseph Kang'ethe, was a political organisation in colonial Kenya formed in 1924/5 to act on behalf of the Gĩkũyũ community by presenting their concerns to the British government. One of its greatest grievances was the expropriation of the most productive land by British settlers from African farmers. Most members of the organisation were from the Gĩkũyũ tribe.
KCA was formed after the colonial government banned the earlier Young Kikuyu Association founded by Harry Thuku and the East African Association. Jomo Kenyatta, later the first president of Kenya, joined it to become its General Secretary in 1927.
The Kikuyu Central Association was banned in 1940 when World War II reached East Africa. Some fighters of the later Mau-Mau still understood their struggle as continuation of KCA and even called themselves KCA.
The end of World War II, however, saw the new type of African organisation that went beyond tribal boundaries with the rise of the Kenya African Union that later was to become KANU.
KCA published the Muiguithania ("the reconciler"), a Kikuyu language newspaper. It was banned alongside KCA in 1940.