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{{short description|Kenyan politician and journalist}}
'''Pio Gama Pinto''' (31 March 1927 – 24 February 1965) was a [[Kenyan]] [[journalist]], politician and freedom fighter. He was a socialist leader who dedicated his life to the liberation of the Kenyan people and became [[Kenyan independence|independent Kenya's]] first martyr in 1965.<ref>{{cite web|title=Pinto, Pio Gama (1927–1965)|url=http://www.blackwellreference.com/public/tocnode?id=g9781405184649_yr2012_chunk_g97814051846491190|publisher=Blackwell Reference Online|accessdate=29 December 2012}}</ref>

==Early years==
Pinto was born in [[Nairobi]] on 31 March 1927 to a [[Indians in Kenya|Kenyan Asian]] family of [[Konkani people|Konkani]] [[Goan Catholic]] descent. Born to immigrant [[Goan Catholics|Goan parents]] hailing from the Indian states of [[Goa]] and [[Maharashtra]], his father was an official in the [[British East Africa|colonial government of Kenya]] while his mother was a housewife.<ref name="books.google">{{cite book|last=Vaz|first=J. Clement|title=Profiles of Eminent Goans, Past and Present|year=1997|publisher=Concept Publishing Company|location=New Delhi|pages=241|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7DJLxYBYA-YC&q=pio+gama+pinto&pg=PA241|isbn=9788170226192}}</ref> At age eight, he was sent to [[India]] for his education and spent the next nine years there, passing his [[matriculation]] exams at St. Joseph's High School, [[Arpora]] and then studying science at [[Karnatak College Dharwar|Karnatak College]], [[Dharwar]] for two years before joining the [[Indian Air Force]] in 1944 as an apprentice ground engineer. He then took up a job in the Posts and Telegraph office in [[Bombay]], participated in a general strike and became a founding member of the Goa National Congress whose aim was the [[liberation of Goa]] from Portuguese rule.<ref name="awaazmagazine">{{cite news|title=Pio Gama Pinto - Independant [sic] Kenya's First Marytr|url=http://www.awaazmagazine.com/index.php/latest-issue/item/304-pio-gama-pinto-independant-kenyas-first-marytr|accessdate=29 December 2012|newspaper=Awaaz Magazine|date=2 November 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140903130905/http://www.awaazmagazine.com/index.php/latest-issue/item/304-pio-gama-pinto-independant-kenyas-first-marytr|archive-date=3 September 2014|url-status=dead}}</ref> When only seventeen, he started an agitation in Bombay against the [[Portuguese colonies|Portuguese colonial occupation]] of [[Goa]].<ref name="books.google" /> His political activism soon made it necessary for him to return to Kenya to avoid being arrested and deported to the Tarrafal concentration camp in [[Cape Verde]].

==Political career==
In 1949 Pinto returned to Kenya and, after a succession of clerical jobs, became involved in local politics aimed at overthrowing British colonial rule in Kenya. He turned to journalism and worked with the ''Colonial Times'' and the ''[[Daily Chronicle (United Kingdom)|Daily Chronicle]]''. In 1954, five months after his marriage to Emma Dias, he was rounded up in the notorious [[Mau Mau uprising|Operation Anvil]] and spent the next four years in detention on [[Manda Island]]. He was kept in confinement from early 1958 until October 1959 at [[Kabarnet]].<ref name="goanvoice">{{cite web|title=Mrs Emma Gama Pinto|url=http://goanvoice.org.uk/supplement/EmmaGamaPinto.html|accessdate=29 December 2012}}</ref>

In 1960 he founded the [[Kenya African National Union]] (KANU) newspaper ''Sauti Ya KANU'', and later, ''Pan African Press'', of which he subsequently became Director and Secretary.<ref name="awaazmagazine" /><ref>{{cite book|last=Meusburger|first=Peter|title=Knowledge and Space: Cultural Memories: the Geographical Point of View|year=2011|publisher=Springer|location=Heidelberg|pages=318}}</ref>
Pinto played an active role in campaigning for KANU during the 1961 elections which it won. In 1963 he was elected a Member of the Central Legislative Assembly and in July 1964 was appointed a Specially Elected Member of the House of Representatives.<ref>{{cite web|title=Pio Gama Pinto (1927–1965)|url=http://safariafricaradio.com/index.php/typogrpahy/98-featured-story/771-pio-gama-pinto-19271965|publisher=Safari Africa Radio|accessdate=29 December 2012}}</ref> He worked to establish the Lumumba Institute in 1964 to train KANU party officials.<ref name="awaazmagazine" />

==Assassination==
In [[Nairobi]], on 24 February 1965, Pinto was shot at very close range in the driveway while waiting for the gate to open.<ref name="books.google"/><ref>"Pinto, Pio Gama", in ''Historical Dictionary of Kenya'', Robert M. Maxon and Thomas P. Ofcansky, eds. (Rowman & Littlefield, 2014) pp287-288</ref> He was with his daughter in his car at the time of his killing. The police set out to find three gunmen in connection with the murder. [[Kisilu Mutua]] and Chege Thuo, teenagers at the time, were arrested on the day of the murder. Kisilu and Chege informed the [[Criminal Investigation Department (Kenya)|C.I.D.]] that they were hired by [[Ochola Ogaye Mak'Anyengo|Ochola Mak’Anyengo]], the secretary general of the Kenya Petroleum Oil workers union, to frighten Pinto ostensibly on account of his interfering with the union. Mak’Anyengo was arrested following these accusations. At the police lineup however, the accused affirmed that [[Ochola Ogaye Mak'Anyengo|Ochola Mak’Anyengo]] resembled the man who hired them, but he was not the actual culprit who had identified himself as Mak'Anyengo. [[Ochola Ogaye Mak'Anyengo|Ochola Mak’Anyengo]] was cleared of any involvement and released. After the case was heard in court, Thuo was acquitted, but Mutua was given the death sentence. This sentence was later reduced to life in prison following an appeal. <ref> Report of the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission 2013. Excerpts available from: http://www.goanvoice.org.uk/gvuk_files/Pio_Gama_Pinto_TRJC_2013.pdf</ref> <ref> How Pinto Murder was Plotted…Kisilu Framed. Daily Nation, 19th June 2000 </ref>

Pinto became the first Kenyan politician to be assassinated after Independence. At the time of his assassination, Pinto was 38. He was survived by his wife, Emma and his three daughters Linda, Malusha and Tereshka. Two years after the assassination, Emma and her daughters migrated to Canada.<ref name="goanvoice" /> Different theories have been forwarded about the assassination with some suggesting that Pinto was killed by Jomo Kenyatta's men and others seeing Pinto's assassination as the extermination of an avowed Communist with links to the Mozambican liberation movement by neocolonial forces.<ref>{{cite book|last=Cohen|first=David William|title=The Risks of Knowledge: Investigations Into the Death of the Hon. Minister John Robert Ouko|year=2004|publisher=Ohio University Press|location=Athens, Ohio|pages=4|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JOHBLpEmiEAC&q=pio+gama+pinto&pg=PA4|isbn=9780821415986}}</ref> An article published in [[Transition Magazine|Transition magazine]] in 1966 noted that a letter was circulated amongst Members of Parliament after Pinto’s murder warning of the risks of cooperating with the [[eastern bloc]]. [[Bildad Kaggia]] was quoted saying that Pinto’s killing was not an ordinary murder but a political one. Despite the wide perception that this was a political assassination, the police investigation treated the murder as not political. <ref> Freedom and suffering. Chapter in: Kenya: Between Hope and Despair, 1963 – 2011 by Daniel Branch. Yale University Press. Nov 2011 </ref><ref>The Changing face of Kenyan Politics. Transition Magazine. 1966, No. 25 pp 44-50</ref>

When Mutua, convicted for the murder of Pinto, was released after 35 years in prison through a [[presidential pardon]] by [[President of Kenya|President]] [[Daniel Arap Moi]], Mutua insisted on his innocence and called for thorough investigations to identify Pinto's true assassins.<ref>{{cite news|title=Kenyan freed after 35 years|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/1424276.stm|accessdate=29 December 2012|newspaper=BBC|date=5 July 2001}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=RIGHTS-KENYA: Tasting New Life after 36 Years in Jail|url=http://www.ipsnews.net/2001/07/rights-kenya-tasting-new-life-after-36-years-in-jail/|accessdate=29 December 2012|newspaper=Inter Press Service News Agency|date=July 11, 2001}}</ref>

==Posthumous commemoration==
After his death, Pio Pinto's colleagues established a Pinto Trust Fund to help his widow and family to which leftist governments such as those of China and Tanzania contributed.<ref>{{cite book|last=Mwakikagile|first=Godfrey|title=Nyerere and Africa: End of an Era|year=2010|publisher=New Africa Press|location=Dar es Salaam|pages=573|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D4LcR4iOmcYC&q=pio+gama+pinto&pg=PA573|isbn=9780980253412}}</ref> In September 1965, Mrs. Emma Gama Pinto was invited to [[Santiago, Chile]], to receive a posthumous prize awarded to her husband by the [[International Organisation of Journalists]] for his contribution in journalism to the liberation of African countries from foreign domination and exploitation.<ref>{{cite book|last=Vaz|first=J. Clement|title=Profiles of Eminent Goans, Past and Present|year=1997|publisher=Concept Publishing Company|location=New Delhi|pages=243|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7DJLxYBYA-YC&q=pio+gama+pinto&pg=PA241|isbn=9788170226192}}</ref> In 2008, Kenya released a series of four stamps titled Heroes of Kenya, one of which depicted Pinto.<ref name="goanvoice" />

==References==
{{reflist}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pinto, Pio Gama}}
[[Category:1927 births]]
[[Category:1965 deaths]]
[[Category:Assassinated Kenyan politicians]]
[[Category:Deaths by firearm in Kenya]]
[[Category:Kenya African National Union politicians]]
[[Category:Kenyan people of Indian descent]]
[[Category:Goan Catholics]]
[[Category:People murdered in Kenya]]
[[Category:Kenyan people of Goan descent]]
[[Category:Kenyan Roman Catholics]]
[[Category:Kenyan trade unionists]]
[[Category:Kenyan politicians of Indian descent]]
[[Category:Kenyan socialists]]

Pio Gama Pinto - Revision history

WECElbert296866: adjust section for consistency and fixed typos

imported>Citation bot: Alter: url. URLs might have been anonymized. | Use this bot. Report bugs. | Suggested by Abductive | Category:1965 deaths | #UCB_Category 3738/4137