Class & Ideology
The political context of African publishing is not given the attention it deserves. The elephants in the room are capitalism and imperialism, which distort every aspect of life in favour of the ruling elite and make policies that are against the interest of working people. Essentially, there are class divisions and class struggles in Kenya (and Africa). It is the capitalist ideology that the ruling class promotes while suppressing the socialist aspirations of people. Thus the power relations are also distorted as the ruling class controls all state power (political, economic, military, government policies, police) with the support of imperialism. They use their power to suppress any attempts for equality and justice in the society. This includes the suppression or lack of support for the independent publishing sector whose existence itself is made difficult by these political factors.
Content of Publishing
The above political factor then impacts on the content of publishing. It is easy to publish books that follow the lines set by comprador governments, but anything that questions or challenges government policies comes under immediate government attacks in various ways. It is particularly difficult to publish historical and political books— non-fiction in general — that reflect working class interests and perspectives.
Financial Independence
The above factors then affect financial viability and independence of small, independent publishers. Getting funds from NGOs is one avenue open to them, but then political and other strings are attached. Yet, without such support, it is only the rich who can afford to publish books. And their perspective usually reflects their class position. It is particularly difficult for independent publishers as the major global corporations have the resources to capture African publishing markets. At the same time, they have captured the only profit-making service available to the publishing — school textbook market.
Relevance of Publications
Thus, many books published (at least in Kenya) are not relevant to working people and do not support their struggles for equality and justice. The ones that are published and easily available tend to mould the thinking of the readers towards capitalism and support for the ruling elites. The needs of workers, peasants, pastoralists, fisher people, the urban and rural poor and unemployed people are neglected. As a result more fiction —romance, detective and similar — is generally published than non-fiction as it is politically safer. African writers, academics and intellectuals are thus deprived of an avenue to publish their records on history and other subjects.
Language of Publication
The issue of relevance is related to the use of language in publishing. The majority is in English. Ruo Kimani-Ruo, the Mshauri Mkuu at Edusystems, highlights the issue of language:
Kiswahili, being the national language of Kenya and Tanzania and now being taught in all schools and in universities in these two countries, needs a fresh stimulus from the publishers in Africa to support its growth and development, not only in Kenya and Tanzania, but also other regions of Africa where the language is now widely spoken and now taught in schools such as in Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and South Africa. Kiswahili writers’ workshops and symposiums need to be supported with serious and focused funding by the publishers in these countries.
Publishing of progressive poetry and collections should receive greater emphasis and support. Institutions related to publishing such as printers, bookshops, and libraries should be promoted and training of editors enhanced. Poets should form a national union of poets to enable young people to participate in the art. Competitions among budding poets should be encouraged and talented poets gifted.
Activist Publishing
The only way any relevant books can be published is done by activist publishers who publish not for money as such but out of their political and social commitment for working people and through their support for people’s struggles for justice and equality. That implies that they have to support publishing from their own limited resources. That then limits the quantity of their publication, although the quality and relevance are high.
It is not surprising that important historical and political material — books, pamphlets and periodicals — on Kenya have been written and published by political movements, eg. December Twelve Movements’ Pambana and ‘InDependent Kenya’; Mwakenya’s ‘Draft Minimum Programme’ (1987) and ‘Kenya: Register of Resistance, 1986’ (1987) and Umoja’s ‘Moi’s Reign of Terror: A Decade of Nyayo Crimes Against the People of Kenya’. It is not surprising that few, if any, public, academic or research libraries in Kenya even collect such material. It falls on the independent Ukombozi Library to do so, in its Kenya Resistance Archives (KRA).
Lack of Relevant Libraries
Another reason that publishing in Africa suffers is because there are no appropriate avenues for books to be made available to actual and potential readers. Public libraries have failed to fulfil their main task of providing relevant material to working class. Like publishing, libraries have also become victims of the capitalist status quo and provide material often acquired from donations from foreign agencies and embassies. Given the fact that most public libraries have retained the colonial, capitalist model of public libraries, access to material relevant to working people, in terms of content, language and class perspectives, is not only not available in such libraries, but even when available, it is not promoted and made available to working class readers in appropriate ways. For further discussion on this, see Durrani (1998 a and b). Although written over 25 years ago, these articles are still relevant, indicating that libraries and information services have remained mostly static and pro-capitalism since independence.
Information, Knowledge & Books captured by Capitalism and Imperialism
It is not surprising that as entire countries in Africa have been captured by capitalism, their publishing sectors are similarly captured in the interest of hiding facts and knowledge about the damage done by capitalism and about the existence of alternative, socialist societies where rights and power of working class are protected. The key battleground is the capture of minds, influencing the thinking of children and adults, workers and peasants, rural and urban youth in employment or not. Such actions from imperialism then help to hide important facts of the capitalist economic exploitation and social oppression that they carry out. Liberating minds then should be the main focus of relevant African publishers. The damage done to the awareness of people in Africa about their societies and history enables capitalism to continue its exploitation with minimal resistance. This can be illustrated by three examples of hidden information about individuals and organisations — all in the interest of showing capitalism as TINA – there is no alternative to it, the capitalist mantra to suppress socialism.
Case Studies of Information Suppressed – Only to be released by Independent Publishers
- The hidden ‘Israeli’ Agent that was J. M. Kariuki
J. M. Kariuki was promoted by capitalism as a people-oriented politician who stood for the rights of working people. He was promoted as ‘a man who challenged the status quo’. Yet unknown to most people in Kenya, J M Kariuki was an “Israeli’ agent and helped ‘Israel’ to infiltrate the Kenya government with the support of Jomo Kenyatta, the Prime Minister of Kenya, as Kamau (2025) shows. It is indeed surprising that even though Kenya has one of the most developed publishing industry in Africa, no books were published for decades revealing the true nature of the popular politician who would have lost his popularity if facts about his life were widely known.
2. The Hidden Life and Times of Pio Gama Pinto
Pio Gama Pinto was an important socialist politician, trade unionist and a member of Mau Mau for which he acquired arms from South Africa. He was assassinated by agents of the Kenya government in 1965 and all information about him was suppressed by the government. The flourishing publishers in Kenya failed to publish a book on him because of political pressure. It took a small, independent publisher — Vita Books — to publish the first book on him in 2018 by Durrani (Ed. 2018).
3. The Hidden History of Kenya People’s Union
Kenya People’s Union (KPU) was an opposition political party in Kenya from 1966-1969. It wanted socialism in Kenya in opposition to the capitalism of the ruling KANU Party. And that is why it was suppressed in 1969 and its leaders were detained. Again, like Pio Gama Pinto, no books were published on its history and policies by any publisher. It again took Vita Books, the independent publisher to publish key information about it and reproduce its key documents in Durrani (Ed. 2023).And Vita Books is taking another step in publishing later this year a full history of KPU written by Ogula (Forthcoming).
African publishers, researchers, academics, historians as well as archives and libraries can rightly be held responsible for not providing people with such information that can liberate their minds from capitalist and imperialist prisons.
A Model that works
Within the limitations that class, ideology and politics imposes on Kenya, it has been possible to develop a model of an independent publisher and an independent library that seems to meet the information, knowledge, educational and political needs of working people. This is the close relationship between Vita Books and Ukombozi Library. As mentioned earlier, Vita Books has published a number of key books not taken up by any other publisher. It owes its success to publishing material from working class perspective and records history and current status of class status in Kenya. But it does not work in isolation: It works closely with Ukombozi Library which does not restrict its activities to the role of the traditional public library. It covers a wide range of roles as indicated in the following chart. It is not claimed that this model is applicable in other countries in Africa, as each country needs to develop its own methods of ensuring the successful existence of independent publishers and libraries. It remains, however, as a possible model that can be relevant to other countries.
Conclusion
African publishing, as most of the countries themselves, is in a capitalist prison with imperialism and comprador governments deciding the future of its people, resources and every aspect of their lives. In this setup, if publishing is to be liberated from this death-like grip, it will need to enter the political arena which it has mostly avoided to date. It is time that independent publishers join hands with other progressive forces in their societies that are in struggle against capitalism and imperialism. There is no neutrality in this struggle. The only way is to join people’s struggle for justice and equality. At the same time, independent publishers in each African country need to join hands with, and give and receive solidarity from, their counterparts in other African countries. International solidarity can also be achieved for African Left publishers by joining the International Left Publishers Association. There are many challenges in this approach, but there is no alternative for publishing to joining people’s struggle for justice and equality. Otherwise, they will remain at the margin of social life.
References
Durrani, Shiraz (1998a): Independence in Kenya and the lost opportunity to build a people oriented library service. Library Review. 47 (8) 388-394.
Durrani, Shiraz (1998b): Information relevance, equality and material security – the Kenyan experience. Library Review. 47 (1) 20-25.
Durrani, Shiraz (Ed. 2018): Pio Gama Pinto: Kenya’s Unsung Martyr, 1927-1965. Nairobi: Vita Books. Available from African Books Collective at https://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/pio-gama-pinto
Durrani, Shiraz (2023): Two Paths ahead: The Ideological Struggle between Capitalism and Socialism in Kenya, 1960-1970. Nairobi: Vita Books. Available from African Books Collective at: https://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/two-paths-ahead
Kamau, John (2025): JM Kariuki, Mossad and the Making of National Youth Service. Nation. 05-03-2025.
Ogula, Paul Akello (Forthcoming): The Struggle for Socialism in Kenya: The Case of Kenya People’s Union. Nairobi: Vita Books
March 10, 2025
Shiraz Durrani is a British-Kenyan library science professional and author known for his contributions to the social and political dimensions of information and librarianship. His work often focuses on the intersection of information, politics, and liberation struggles, particularly in the context of Kenya and the broader anti-imperialist movement. Some of his articles are available at https://independent.academia.edu/DurraniShiraz and books at: https://www.africanbookscollective.com/search-results form.keywords=Shiraz+Durrani
