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The idea is that Kwanzaa is supposed to mean "first fruits." There were pagan religions that had festivals celebrating the first fruits, but they were tied to the harvest. Is there any commonly-eaten food plant that produces its harvest in late December? Perhaps there are some places in the tropics where it is always hot and some fruit might be ripe in late December, but for most agriculturalists it's a weird time to pick.

On antebellum plantations in the Old South, slaves often were given the days between Christmas and New Year's off (apart from a few necessary tasks like milking the cows). I don't think they want to make a connection between that tradition and Kwanzaa.

The pagan Romans celebrated the birthday of the sun on December 25, which was then the date of the winter solstice (when the sun was about to start moving northward in the sky). The early Christians did not know the actual date of Jesus' birth so they picked December 25 to put a Christian meaning on the day of the pagan feast.