Why was Jomo Kenyatta arrested and imprisoned during the Mau Mau emergency?

During the Mau Mau Rebellion, which began in 1952, British colonial authorities arrested Jomo Kenyatta and charged him with directing the militant movement. As president of the Kenya African Union, Kenyatta had advocated for African political representation and a transition to majority rule, though he consistently denounced the violence associated with the Mau Mau and sought to differentiate his party from the rebels.123

Despite his denials of any affiliation with the militant group, Kenyatta was convicted in 1953 of managing the Mau Mau terrorist organization and was sentenced to seven years of imprisonment. The trial was widely denounced as a sham, and many historians view the proceedings as a political maneuver by the colonial government to suppress nationalist leadership during the state of emergency. Following his imprisonment and subsequent house detention, Kenyatta eventually negotiated the terms of Kenya's independence and became the country's first prime minister in 1963.123