Cabral Pinto: Willy Mutunga Under Cover

For over 30 years, Willy Mutunga has blazed the trail in starting many important public conversations about remaking Kenya and the wider world into a better society. As a public intellectual, he has consistently challenged convenient stereotypes in an effort to bring down the social barriers erected by fear and ignorance, and led in persuading individuals and communities to re-examine widely held prejudices and to start difficult dialogues. Between 2006 and 2011, Mutunga wrote a weekly column in the Saturday Nation. It is from these contributions, under the pen name Cabral Pinto – a combination of the surnames of the two African ideologues he greatly admired — that the 146 articles in this volume are selected. The clarity of Willy’s moral voice is unmistakable on a broad variety of themes, ranging from exhortations for an alternative leadership that would deliver a human rights state, to an unapologetic call for mass action as a peaceful way to bring change. This collection by Cabral Pinto is the story of Kenya’s long democracy struggle, told by a pro-democracy activist.