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Panelist Hetty ter Haar |
A Critical Analysis of the Social and Economic Impact of Asian Diaspora in Kenya Francis Ogino, University of Nairobi, Kenya For centuries Eastern Africa had contact
with people from other continents, particularly from Asia. The influx
of Asian people into Kenya became more dramatic when British imperialists
undertook to open up Kenya’s interior by building the Kenya-Uganda
railway between 1895 and 1901. Many Asians of Indian origin, hired
as indentured laborers, were brought to Kenya to help with the building
of the railway. The railway would open Kenya to a sophisticated web
business and of social interaction. Later, at the height of colonialism,
the Asians then settled in Kenya and less discriminated by the colonialists
established and operated retail and wholesale businesses. Gradually,
the Asian Diaspora in Kenya grew to dominate business and industry
in post-independent Kenya. Today, Asians of Kenya citizenship own great
business empires across the entire East and Central African region,
a phenomenon that has gradually elevated Kenya into a regional economic
and social hub. This paper therefore seeks to analyze critically the
social and economic impact of Asian Diaspora in Kenya. Specifically,
the paper utilizes the literature on globalization and ethnic identities
to examine how the Asians in Diaspora in Kenya have managed to sustain
their identity in Kenya while they remained a major player in a complex
regional economy. Further the paper interrogates the post-independence
education structures that promoted acceptance of diversity in an originally
purely African environment, thereby enhancing opportunity for diasporic
Asian communities to flourish in Kenya. |