Oburu: The Raila I know and what the future holds for him

“This is not an ordinary election,” Dr Oburu Oginga said in an exclusive interview with People Daily on what the future holds for his brother, Raila Odinga, who is seeking the presidency for the fifth time.

“(President) Uhuru has seen Raila’s capability and is sure that he is the only person who can take Kenya to the next level.”

Should Raila win the August 9 presidential race — which is now 17 days away — he will become Kenya’s fifth president.

However, if he loses, Oburu says the family will request him to take a break from active politics.

“We are confident as a family that he is going to win but in the unlikely event that he loses the election, we will now advise him to leave and focus on something else,” said Oburu, who is also the Odinga family spokesman.

Raila will be facing off with Deputy President William Ruto who is also seeking to succeed President Uhuru on a UDA ticket. His party has a coalition pact with several others under the Kenya Kwanza Alliance, which is locked in a battle of supremacy with Raila’s Azimio-One Kenya Coalition Party.

Also in the presidential race are George Wajackoyah of the Roots Party and David Mwaure of the Agano Party.

All four candidates will face off in a televised debate on Tuesday next week.

Recent opinion polls indicate that Raila and Ruto are locked in a neck-and-neck race but many of them have tipped Raila to win although this year, there is an inordinately large number of undecided voters.

This means the presidential election can go either way.

Whereas this is the fifth time that Raila, 77, is seeking to be Kenya’s chief executive, it is Ruto’s first attempt.

According to Oburu, the August 9 election will be a defining moment in Raila’s political career which spans over three decades.

“He has spent all his life fighting for Kenyans and I think this is just but his moment to liberate his people,” Oburu said about his younger brother.

Unlike in previous attempts, this time around, Raila enjoys the backing of an incumbent President following his 2018 handshake with President Uhuru Kenyatta and the subsequent closing of ranks between the two former arch-rivals.

Uhuru is leading other political leaders — including many from his own Mt Kenya backyard — in drumming up support for Raila.

Oburu says the move by the President to support Raila is a clear indicator that it could be a fifth time lucky for Raila.

Raila’s first attempt at the presidency was in 1997 when he vied under the National Democratic Party (NDP) ticket. That year, he finished third after Kanu’s Daniel Arap Moi and Democratic Party’s Mwai Kibaki.

Moi, who was seeking a second and final term, returned to State House while Kibaki became leader of the Official Opposition, sharing benches with Raila in Parliament.

Kibaki deal

Come December 2002, the two were part of the National Rainbow Coalition (Narc) and Raila endorsed Kibaki to be the coalition’s presidential candidate. The two had an agreement that after winning the election, Kibaki would appoint Raila prime minister, but this did not happen after Kibaki won.

As a result, Raila once again returned to the presidential race in 2007, when he and Kibaki were locked in a hotly contested race. Kibaki was declared the winner, a result that Raila challenged.

Kibaki’s declaration as winner sparked post-election violence that rocked the country in the early months of 2008 when the international community intervened.

As part of a power-sharing agreement, Raila was named prime minister after the formation of the grand coalition government.

In 2013 and 2017, Raila vied again but lost to Jubilee Party’s Uhuru. However, he boycotted the second election of 2017 that the Supreme Court ordered after the first was nullified. Oburu now believes it is his brother’s time.

“He has been consistent in his quest to fight for the rights of Kenyans and change how things are done,” he told People Daily.

“We all know what happened and have always believed that he is that leader who was elected but has never been sworn in.”

Raila’s name has dominated Kenya’s political arena for over 25 years. He is loved and hated in equal measure, as the one-time Vice President Kijana Wamalwa once said.

Wamalwa said there were two types of people; those who love Raila (who he described as Railamania) and those who hate him (who he described as suffering from Railaphobia).

Oburu had his take on this sharp divide.

“I don’t understand why some people fear him. What I know of him is that he is strict and firm but even now you have seen how things have changed. Those who were seen to be fearing him have now embraced him fully.”

School years

Oburu, 79, traces his brother’s relentlessness to the early 50s when he was a pupil at Maranda Intermediate School in his Bondo rural home in Siaya.

“My brother never gives up. He once fell from a tree, and had a fracture in his leg but forced himself to walk back home despite being in deep pain,” Oburu recalled.

At Maranda Primary, his schoolmates included Odeny Ngure, who went on to serve as Rarieda MP and Joseph Odhiambo, who became a senior counsel, and Henry Oketch, who became a prominent businessman.

Both Raila and Oburu were taken for admission in 1953 by their father, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga who at that time was the chairman of the Luo Union in East Africa, a body whose mission was to unite members of the Luo community living in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.

Jaramogi would go on to serve as Kenya’s first Vice-President before falling out with founding President Jomo Kenyatta, Uhuru’s father.

Jaramogi transferred both Raila and Oburu from Kisumu Union, then known as Komulo School in Kisumu town to their village school in Nyamira Kango.

“Jaramogi claimed that we would grow up as lazy children if we spent most of our time in a school within the town. So he decided to immediately transfer us to the village.”

Oburu recalled that on many occasions, young Raila would confront and challenge his teachers whenever he thought something was not right.

“Raila never gave up. In school, teachers feared him because, as young as he was, you could not just punish or accuse him for something that he felt was not right,” Oburu recalled.

Once, Oburu agreed to be caned for a misdemeanour but Raila declined, arguing that the punishment was not justified. Their teacher, Mr Otongo, later called Raila aside and apologised.

Raila’s stepmother, Susan Oginga, who was the Jaramogi’s third wife said: “Mzee (Jaramogi) used to say that Raila and Oburu were different in character. But you see it’s just normal in a family that children have different traits.”

Raila may be just one of Jaramogi’s children, but he is the one who never gives up. Now, he has set his eyes on August 9.

Oburu said Raila had been consistent in his fight for the freedom of Kenyans.

“That is the reason why he should be elected the fifth president,” he said.