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{
    "id": 515161,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/515161/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 24,
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    "content": "was unthinkable to elect a woman and particularly an African woman as a dean of any faculty. Prof. Mugo had also distinguished herself in the struggle for the second liberation and for that matter, she was often incarcerated in police cells. I remember at one time, she was even incarcerated in Central Police Station with a baby girl of less than six months, which was quite an arduous experience. It is because of that bravery to stand against authoritarianism at a time when it was thought to be an anathema for anybody from the Agikuyu Community to stand against Mzee Jomo Kenyatta’s regime because as a child of the home or nyumba, you were expected to toe the line. Prof. Mugo, Prof. Ngugi wa Thiong’o and Koigi Wamwere, were the people who stood for human rights and democracy at a very difficult time and gave us the courage to follow in their footsteps. Therefore, in 1980, we as young scholars in the faculty at the University of Nairobi decided to campaign for Prof. Mugo as our dean against the grain of established scholars who thought that they were fountains of wisdoms at the university.We succeeded and she was enthroned as the first woman Dean of Social Sciences Faculty almost in the whole of Africa. Subsequent to the attempted coup in 1982 and the detention of even more scholars, myself having escaped to Mexico just before that tragic event, people like Chief Justice Willy Mutunga, Mukaru Ng’ang’a were then detained but Prof. Mugo and Prof. Ngugi wa Thiong’o managed to escape to abroad and they have never come back to this country as scholars. Prof. Mugo has come here occasionally but she has continued for many years to serve as a scholar in Zimbabwe and in the USA in two distinguished universities, Cornell University and Syracuse University. Therefore, the Americans, unlike us, who recognized quality and scholarship are going to honour her at this symposium to which world scholars have been invited to honour and say goodbye to Prof. Mugo as a member of the faculty. She will now become professor emeritus and she intends to come back to Kenya and offer her services to her nation as professor emeritus Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences from Syracuse University. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I beg this House to salute Prof. Mugo and all our scholars abroad who have distinguished themselves in scholarship and remind this country that they too are worth the recognition of this nation. I beg to honour."
}