His father was a Kenyan participant in the Mau Mau Uprising, and served as Kenya’s first ambassador to the United Nations. Morello’s paternal great-uncle, Jomo Kenyatta, was the first elected president in Kenyan history. His parents met in August 1963, while attending a pro-democracy protest in Nairobi, Kenya.
Kenyatta had the Constitution amended to expand his powers. He made the Kikuyu-led KANU practically the only political party of Kenya. He consolidated his power greatly, and placed several of his Kikuyu tribesmen in most of the powerful state and security offices and posts. State security forces harassed dissident.
In the 1969 elections, Kenyatta banned the only other party, KPU (formed and led by his former vice president, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga who had been forced to quit KANU along with his left leaning allies), detained its leaders, and called elections in which only KANU was allowed to participate.
On 29 January 1970 he was sworn in as President for a further term. For the remainder of his presidency, Kenya was effectively a one-party state, and Kenyatta made use of detention, appeals to ethnic loyalties, and careful appointment of government jobs to maintain his commanding position in Kenya’s political system.
The Kenyan way and the Chicago way...sure seem a lot alike.