Waiyaki Wa Hinga was the owner of a large Agikuyu fort at the frontier of Kikuyu country.
Upon encountering the Imperial British East Africa Company, he was genuinely interested in establishing and cementing ties with them.
However, Kikuyus did not have paramount chiefs in their political system; Waiyaki was a Kikuyu Muthamaki (singular) out of the many influential athamakis (plural).
[1] He had no powers to make a treaty that affected the welfare of the community, nor even control the warriors, which Waiyaki tried to do a number of times when his soldiers wanted to attack the company.
This occurred after an expedition to punish Kikuyus of Githinguri for killing Maktubu, a worker of the Imperial British East Africa Company, fails.