15/01/2026
HISTORY: Pokot Resistance to Colonial Destocking Recalled in New Historical Account
A little-known chapter of colonial resistance in Pokot land has been brought to light by Kenyan historian Levin Opiyo, based in the United Kingdom, detailing how the Pokot community in present-day Baringo and West Pokot counties defied British colonial destocking policies in the 1940s.
According to Opiyo’s account, the colonial administration introduced destocking measures aimed at reducing cattle numbers in Pokot country, proposing that pastoralists dispose of about 10 per cent of their herds in exchange for cash. However, the policy met fierce resistance from the Pokot, for whom cattle were not merely economic assets but the very foundation of social, cultural and spiritual life.
Central to the resistance was Chepusia, a blind Pokot prophetess whose influence spread widely across the community. She reportedly provided charms believed to protect the Pokot from the power of the white man and urged them to resist the destocking exercise. Her authority, Opiyo notes, became a major obstacle to the colonial administration’s plans.
In an attempt to undermine her influence, missionaries from the Seventh Day Adventist Church, then operating a mobile hospital and pioneering cataract surgeries in the region, took Chepusia for treatment. After her cataracts were removed and her sight restored, the act was intended to demonstrate what the missionaries and administrators considered the superiority of “white man’s medicine” over indigenous spiritual power.
Despite this, the Pokot continued to reject government compensation for their cattle. Frustrated, the colonial authorities introduced a more coercive tactic: individuals were ordered to slaughter their excess cows and present the tails at Kapenguria Police Station as proof of compliance.
What followed, Opiyo recounts, was a display of quiet defiance and ingenuity. Instead of slaughtering their animals, many Pokot herders simply cut off the tails of live cattle and delivered them to the police. The volume of tails received convinced the administration that the campaign was succeeding—until patrols into Pokot villages revealed large herds of cattle, all conspicuously tailless.
Alarmed, the District Commissioner and Inspector Mike White, then in charge of Kapenguria Police Station, intensified patrols across the area. During these patrols, officers repeatedly encountered stick barriers laid across paths. Investigations by the Special Branch later concluded that the sticks were part of a curse ritual, placed on the instructions of Prophetess Chepusia to bring misfortune upon colonial officials enforcing the destocking campaign.
Inspector White later recorded that shortly after one such patrol, misfortune struck the colonial team. Within days, the District Commissioner was kicked in the chest by his horse, suffering broken ribs and requiring evacuation to Kitale. Two European police officers attached to the General Service Unit reportedly fell gravely ill and were hospitalised, while White himself contracted sand-fly fever and was also taken to Kitale Hospital. Only the District Officer remained at the camp.
Reflecting on the events years later, White posed a haunting question: “So, does African magic really exist?” His own answer, Opiyo notes, was cautious but telling — “Perhaps.”
The account adds to a growing body of historical work highlighting how indigenous communities such as the Pokot resisted colonial rule not only through open confrontation, but also through belief systems, strategy and subtle acts of defiance that frustrated imperial control.
