How Baba battled to win the Mulembe nation after Wamalwa

Kenya’s western region, the so-called Mulembe nation, was considered as a Raila Odinga’s stronghold but it took a lot of effort and strategy for him to gain acceptance after the death of his longtime rival Ford Kenya Chairman Michael Kijana Wamalwa in August 2003.

Raila’s influence prior to that was largely confined to his Luo Nyanza region and parts of Nairobi. Leaders in the Mt Kenya region had painted him as a scaremonger who was unfit to lead.

In the 1997 presidential polls, Raila ran on an NDP ticket and got half a million votes mostly from Luo Nyanza and Nairobi while Wamalwa (Ford Kenya) received almost a similar number but mainly from his home turf of former Western province and Trans Nzoia.

That was when Raila realised that to succeed in politics, he needed to build a wider support base that could work with alliances from other regions. That is when he started chipping into Wamalwa’s backyard and also talking to elders like Jackson Kibor and Athanas Kandie from Rift Valley.

Raila and Wamalwa were both members of the Ford Kenya party, when their respective political mentors Raila’s father Jaramogi Oginga Odinga and Masinde Muliro registered it in September 1992.

Through the two founding father’s influence, Ford Kenya became a very popular party in the region the British colonial masters called Nilotic Kavirondo and Bantu Kavirondo. The names were later changed to South and North Kavirodo respectively.

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Things then went haywire after the elderly duo’s death, leading to power struggles emerging in Ford Kenya between Wamalwa and Raila after party chairman Jaramogi Oginga Odinga died in January 2004 aged 82 years.

Signs of impending trouble in Ford Kenya began earlier in 1992, shortly after its registration when Jaramogi convened a national delegates meeting at City Stadium in Nairobi.

The delegates approved the nomination of Jaramogi as chairman and presidential candidate, lawyer Paul Muite as first vice national chairman and Wamalwa as second national vice chairman, while Raila got the junior position of director of elections.

Jaramogi expressed anger at Raila’s behavior of arriving late with a group of rowdy youth from Kibera chanting his name when he was addressing the mammoth crowd.

“Amolo, tell those boys to keep quiet,” shouted the man who was known as the doyen of Opposition politics.

About a week earlier, Jael Mbogo, the first Woman MP in Nairobi had asked Jaramogi who his preferred successor should be among the Ford Kenya Young Turks.

After pausing to digest the question, Jaramogi looked her in the face and told her his choice would be Wamalwa. Muite appeared disadvantaged, because he was fighting allegations of receiving a Sh20 million bribe from Goldenberg scandal architect Kamlesh Pattni.

About 10 years later, during the Goldenberg Commission of Inquiry, Pattni denied ever giving Muite the alleged bribe. He said, it was a Mr James Mburu operating under a company named Multiphasic Exporters Company, who collected the money from his office.

Muite was slowly edged out of Ford Kenya after Jaramogi’s death in 1994, which set the stage for the brutal power fights between Wamalwa, now acting chairman who had the support of then Ugenya MP James Orengo against Raila.

When Ford Kenya elections were called a few months later as expected, Raila declared his candidature to succeed his father in a contest against Wamalwa. He lost and left Ford Kenya for Wamalwa, thus making it a predominantly Luhya supported party.

It is after Wamalwa’s death about 10 years later, that Raila decided to inherit his western base, a no mean feat. At that time Raila had already brought Musalia Mudavadi into his new Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) fold.

He assembled a team of Luhya politicians led by then Kakamega Ford Kenya branch chairman Majanja Ligabo, Elam Lumwaji, who had served as Moses Budamba Mudavadi’s personal assistant, Nairobi business Caleb Kibera, Amb Justus Mudavadi and then youthful politician Martin Andati.

Journalist turned businessman and now politician Ayub Savula was also instrumental in pushing Raila’s agenda in the region. He became Raila’s confidant while serving as The Standard correspondent in Kakamega and later Kisumu bureau.

After the 2005 campaign against the referendum, that team started taking Raila to all the four counties in Western and Trans Nzoia, despite the handicap of limited financial resources.

Raila was driving an old Peugeot 504, that could occasionally break down, giving transport logistical challenges although former Assistant Minister Ayiecho Olweny’s more stable Nissan Patrol could sometimes save the situation.

In January 2006, when he declared his presidential bid in a new year message, the team developed a new narrative that linked Raila to the Wanga, a subtribe of the community.

They planted a story in the minds of the community that Raila had Luhya lineage, a narrative he helped make credible by repeatedly emphasizing it at political rallies across the region, which became a big seller of his name.

In Bungoma, he took advantage of self-acclaimed prophet Elijah Masinde Wanameme of the Dini Ya Musambwa sect’s prophesy that the Bukusu will take over the country’s leadership with assistance of some forces from Lake Victoria.

Masinde who was also a freedom fighter and activist had been detained by the British colonial government for opposing colonial rule. He made the prophesy many years earlier before his death in 1987.

After enlisting a few Bukusu elders, Raila and his team went round convincing voters to elect him in 1997.

He then developed a habit of visiting the homestead ahead of each presidential election to meet and gift Masinde’s then remaining elderly widow and some of his sons at Maeni village near Kimili town.

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The battle for the crucial Western Province vote had taken an unprecedented twist after Wamalwa’s departure. Former Vice President Musalia Mudavadi and then Ford-Kenya Chairman Musikari Kombo were also scrambling for Luhya kingship.

Mudavadi who was in ODM was desperately seeking to upstage Kombo, who found it difficult to fill Wamalwa’s big shoes.

Having been picked to run as Raila’s running mate on the ODM ticket in 2007, Mudavadi also visited Elijah Masinde’s shrine to be blessed as the Luhya leader who would succeed Raila.

The family received and blessed Mudavadi and accused Kombo of ignoring its relevance. The Masinde family said earlier requests made to the Ford-Kenya fraternity for consultation over various issues had been ignored.

After Wamalwa’s death, his mother Esther Nekesa decided to relocate from her late son’s home in Kitale, to her Chwele rural home in Bungoma county. Word then reached Raila that her abandoned house was in a dilapidated condition.

After reading the story filed by Savula, Raila saw another opportunity of making some political mileage in Bungoma. He called the journalist and sent him money to buy construction materials and pay building costs. Upon finishing the work Savula flew with Mama Ida Odinga in a helicopter to Chwele and handed over the house to Nekesa who later died in 2009.

Coincidentally, Savula is perhaps one of the last people to speak to Raila before he died in India this week.

“He wanted my thoughts on political developments in the country,” said Savula yesterday from Kisumu.

Raila told him; “Nimekuwa mgonjwa (I have been sick) but I’m improving. I will be talking to President Ruto so that we can make some more changes in government when I return.”