Tributes are flowing in for one of Kenya’s best-known Anglicans, the Rt. Hon. Raila Odinga, who died of cardiac arrest on October 15 while undergoing treatment in an Indian hospital. He was 80.
The former prime minister was born in a Church Missionary Society hospital, and was an active member of Nairobi’s All Saints’ Cathedral, while also worshiping regularly at Anglican churches in the Diocese of Bondo, in his native region of Southwestern Kenya.
Trained as an engineer in East Germany at the height of the Cold War, Odinga was a dedicated pan-Africanist, widely celebrated for championing Kenya’s progressive Constitution.
His five unsuccessful runs for president tested the East African nation’s institutions to the limit, with its Supreme Court nullifying results for 2017 polls after Odinga’s allegations of fraud, a first in Africa.
Kenya’s current arrangement of a president who rules alongside a prime minister dates from a 2007 power-sharing agreement between Odinga and Mwai Kibaki, who introduced it to bring peace after a violent and divisive election cycle.
Odinga will also be remembered as the East African nation’s longest-serving political detainee. He was charged with treason for his alleged complicity in an attempted coup against President Daniel Arap Moi and held without trial on several separate occasions, for a total of six years.
David Coltart, the mayor of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, and a fellow Anglican, praised Odinga’s activism, which he found inspiring as one of the founders of the Movement for Democratic Change, which struggled against the corrupt leadership of dictator Robert Mugabe.
“I remember him as a staunch advocate for democrats in Zimbabwe,” Coltart said on X.com. “He stood by those who opposed tyranny in Zimbabwe when it was unfashionable to do so.”
Archbishop Jackson Ole Sapit, the Anglican Church of Kenya’s primate, will preside over Odinga’s burial on October 19. He said that the politician’s “social vision will continue to inspire many for years to come.”
“His varied roles and dedicated service to our beloved country, whether as a Member of Parliament for Kibera (1993-2013), Cabinet Minister and later as Prime Minister (2007-13), have always modeled excellence. As a longtime opposition leader, and with unwavering sense of duty and resilient spirit he always inspired courage and conviction among both political allies and competitors alike,” Ole Sapit added.
Bishop David Kodia of Bondo said he had last been with Odinga on June 29, when his wife, Ida Betty Odinga, was made an honorary canon of the diocese at St. Peter’s Parish for her Christian leadership.
“We stand with the family, the nation, and Christians of Bondo in paying tribute to Rt. Hon Raila Odinga. R.I.P,” Kodia said on Facebook.
The Rev. Carolyne Adhola, priest in charge of St. Mary Magdalene Episcopal Church in Silver Spring, Maryland, said she had regularly interacted with Odinga while serving in the Diocese of Bondo. She told The Living Church that this is a sad moment for her Luo people, who are scattered across Africa and the wider world.
“When then-President of Kenya Mr. Daniel Toroitch Arap Moi arrived at the Odinga family home to bury its patriarch on February 5, 1994, I was among a few high school students selected to usher in visitors. Raila told off Moi’s security guards for harassing mourners, saying everyone had come to mourn his father, Jaramogi. That has remained with me ever since. He was courageous in caring for the vulnerable,” she said.
At a burial service she led in Bondo’s Majiwa village in 2010, it was Adhola’s turn to tell off Odinga, then the sitting prime minister.
“He came when I was almost beginning to deliver the sermon. There was a serious disruption from the crowd because of his entry. As usual, his handlers rushed and informed the leader of the service that we need to give him time to talk because he was running late for another errand.
“I declined, saying it was time to listen to the Word of God. I took advantage of the pulpit and directly addressed him in the course of my sermon,” she recalled.
Some of Odinga’s supporters had adapted Christian songs to praise the prime minister, and Adhola focused her words to him on the Second Commandment, which forbids worshiping other gods.
“Baba [Father], we love you so much and we pray for you but your supporters are the ones denying you the chance to be president because they equate you with God,” she remembered preaching.
“Baba listened to my sermon. While some of his supporters and sections of my clergy colleagues condemned me for disrespecting him, baba never condemned when it was his turn to console the family. Some congregants lauded me for telling baba the truth.”
Praying for the repose of Odinga’s soul, Adhola charged leaders worldwide to remember that his leadership was only for a season.
“He fought the good fight for his country. May his death be a lesson to everyone and more particularly to the political class that human beings are mortal and we need God to teach us to number our days, so that we may gain a heart of wisdom,” she said.
Kenya’s President William Ruto has suspended his official engagements for seven days and issued a proclamation granting Odinga state honors, and declared October 17 a public holiday in his honor.
