Peter Mbiyu Koinange was a politician from Kenya. He served in the government and cabinet of Jomo Kenyatta, Kenya's first president, for 16 years. During this time, he held the post of Member of Parliament for the Kiambaa constituency and the portfolios of Minister of State for Education, External Affairs, Pan-African Affairs, as well as Minister of State in the Office of the President.
Background
Born Mbiyu wa Koinange in 1907 in Njunu, Kiambu District he was the eldest son of Koinange Wa Mbiyu, a prominent Kikuyu chief during Kenya's colonial period, and Wairimu, the chief's great wife.He was one of seven children, with another six siblings who died either at birth or early on in their childhood. His elder sister, Isabella, was one of Kenya's first trained African nurses, while his younger brother, Charles Karuga Koinange, served as a colonial chief and was a civil servant in independent Kenya for more than 30 years.
Education
Mbiyu Koinange moved to the United States in 1927 for studying. He attended Hampton Institute in Virginia, where he graduated in 1931. Koinange then started at Ohio Wesleyan University in Delaware, Ohio in 1931, completing a four-year bachelor's degree in 1935. From Ohio, Koinange then received a one-year postgraduate certificate in education from Columbia University in 1936. Mbiyu Koinange then spent a year at the University of Cambridge, St. John's College as a Rhodes Scholar, followed by a year at the University of London Institute of Education before returning to Kenya in 1939.
Career
On his return to Kenya, with extensive qualifications, he was offered a job at a lower salary than that paid to Europeans. He turned it down and threw himself into the establishment of the Kenya African Teachers College to train teachers for the Kikuyu independent schools which expressed the African revolt against the missions.
Politics
In 1946 he was one of the founders of the Kenya African Union, but when Kenyatta returned from Britain, Koinange left him in charge of the Kenya Teachers College and went back to LSE to take a PhD. In 1949 he returned to the college, continued his party activities and went on a delegation.
