Sessional Paper No. 09 of 1961 on The Kenyan Coastal Strip Report of the Commissioner

Abstract

Three continents have contributed to the history of the coastal area of what is now Kenya, and from those contributions has emerged the cosmopolitan population found there today, consisting of Africans, Arabs and Swahilis (including a small number of Bajuni, who now reside within the Protectorate though their lands are outside it), Asians and Europeans. Apart from the period of strong Portuguese influence in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the presence of Europeans as residents is comparatively recent and can be measured in decades. This European population is mainly British. Arabs, Persians and Indians, on the other hand, have been present in the Coastal centers for as long as there is recorded history. Even so, Arab influence the past seems to have been mainly confined to Coastal settlements and rarely to have extended for any length of time far inland. This limitation may have been partly from choice, since the Arab settlements had primarily a trading purpose, and partly for reasons of topography-the harsh, uninhabitable country…