Thread by @CSakwah

This man, Nabongo Mumia Shiundu, was the first African man to be invited to England by the Royal Family. He was invited to attend the coronation of King Edward VII in 1902. An invitation that he failed to honor after heeding advice from his Arab friends at the port of Mombasa

While colonizing Kenya, as the British cutthroats advanced into the interior of Kenya, they made contact with perhaps the largest and most powerful kingdom in Africa at that time, The Wanga Kingdom.
The Wanga Kingdom was so large that it stretched from West Uganda,

to Kapsabet. Nabongo Mumia oversaw the expansion of the Wanga Kingdom by conquering the Luos, Teso, and Kalenjins and recruiting Masaai warriors into his arm. The sheer size of his kingdom and army informed the British' decision against fighting him as they had done with

With Mekatilili Wa Menza, Olaiboni and Koitalel Arap Samoei. Instead, they elected to befriend him. They helped him to fight his enemies, expand his kingdom, and made him a paramount chief and King of the Karovondo, (Modern day Western Kanya, i.e, Nyanza, Western, and N. Rift)

They gave him a car. In exchange, Nabongo Mumia granted the British passage into Nam Lolwe (Lake Victoria) and subsequently into Uganda.
In 1902, during the coronation of King Edward VII, the British monarch extended a friendly invitation

to Nabongo (King in Luhya) Mumia to attend the event. Nabongo Mumia accepted the invitation, prepared a caravan of his men and women, and traveled to the port of Mombasa to board a British ship to England. Upon reaching Mombasa, he met his Arab friends and business partners.

They told him that the invitation to attend the ceremony might have been a ploy to dethrone him from the leadership of his realm. A king is not supposed to leave his Kingdom, they told him. The Arabs were particularly unhappy that the British were replacing them as the main

trade partners with the Wanga Kingdom. Nabongo Mumia heeded their advice. He asked his entourage to onboard the ship and turn back to Elureko (Mumias). It is alleged that the British's invitation had good intentions. After their interactions with the Wanga Kingdom, whereas they

were impressed with its size, leadership structures and organization, they thought the Kingdom was not well-equipped to withstand any modern military attack. They wanted to teach Nabongo the modern ways of ruling and protecting his people.

Many Historians have claimed that had Nabongo accepted the invitation, perhaps Mumias was would have been named the capital city of East African protectorate (Kenya).