Mwinyi said he was encouraged by the Mau Mau in Kenya and the Nama and Herero in Namibia, who achieved post-colonial justice. In 2013, a lawsuit brought by five elderly victims of colonial-era torture and forced labor saw the British government award £19.9 million ($24.8 million) to over 5,000 Kenyans. That led to as many as 40,000 Kenyans launching a similar lawsuit in 2016.
Last year, Germany finally acknowledged that its first genocide was in fact in Namibia at the turn of the century, and committed to compensation in the form of aid. Then in January this year, the descendants of the murdered Herero and Nama people filed a class action lawsuit against the German government.
While Germany’s colonial record was already cruel, it was in Tanzania where their extreme tactics led to the highest fatalities. An estimated 75,000 people died, but some believe it could be as many as 300,000. The African population in the region decreased by as much as three quarters (pdf).
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