Tribute to Retired President Mwai Kibaki

By Odhiambo Orlale

Photo: Courtesy

A dawn walk down Nairobi’s Central Business District from Nairobi Central Railway Station to the Kenya National Assembly brought fond memories of the third President of the Republic of Kenya, Emilio Stanley Mwai Kibaki (1931-2022).

The city walk with my daughter Terry Achieng, was to join other Kenyans to pay our last respects to the fallen hero who reigned from 2002 to 2013 having also served as a Leader of the Opposition, Finance Minister and Member of Parliament for Othaya in Nyeri County and Bahati in Nairobi County.

We started our day taking a 30-minute ride on the Limuru-Nairobi Kenya Railways Corporation (KRC) commuter service from Kibera station and paid a pocket-friendly Kshs.35 each after boarding the crowded coach. The significance of the trip was that the rail service was one of Kibaki’s projects under the Vision 2030 economic blue print which also focused on infrastructural development.

Vision 2030

One of the beneficiaries of the ambitious project was the Kenya Railways Corporation which was revived and passenger and goods services restored on the Nairobi-Nanyuki and the Nairobi-Kisumu line. A multi-billion shillings investment was extended to the Nairobi-Mombasa Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) new line by his successor President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Mass transport in the capital city, Nairobi and its environs, was improved and extended to residents of the city and the peri-urban areas of Ruiru, Embakasi, Lukenya, Ongata Rongai, Ngong, Mai Mahiu and Suswa.

The walk took us through Haile Selassie Avenue past Central Bank of Kenya headquarters, National Treasury, where Kibaki served as VP and Finance Minister, then Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Office of the Deputy President and the Office of the President, where the armed police and National Youth Service (NYS) officers ordered us to turn back and use City Hall Way to Parliament citing security and logistical reason.

As Finance Minister during Jomo Kenyatta’s reign, 1963-1978, Kibaki forged a friendship with his Cabinet colleague, Tom Mboya, and later his brother, Alphonce Okuku, as Mbita MP, and presided over a harambee (funds drive) for Lambwe Secondary School, with my father as the chairman of the Lambwe Welfare Association (LVWA).

The Othaya MP donated a whopping Kshs100,000 from himself and friends. That was a tardy sum in the 1980s and he got a standing ovation from the villagers and guests, for a job well done.

We were turned back at the junction of Sheria House and Parliament Building by the mean-looking officers; others affected were scores of city folks, most of who were heading to work, while others, like my daughter and I, were going to view the remains of our fallen hero who succumbed on his 90th birthday.

We turned back as ordered and used the longer route to Parliament along Harambee Avenue and turned left into the iconic Kenyatta International Conference Centre, which has since been renamed Kenyatta International Convention Centre (KICC).

Memory Lane

According to my father, Enos Seth Orlale, who worked with the Nairobi City Council in the drawing office as an architect, the design of the tallest building in Kenya and East Africa by then in the late 1960s, with 28 floors and a revolving restaurant at the top, was to reflect the African culture by having the amphitheater and the top most floor shaped like a grass-thatched house.

KICC housed the offices of the ruling party for decades under President Kenyatta and his successor, Daniel arap Moi, and is where most party meetings and elections were held. Kibaki had an office there too.

While crossing the building to access City Hall Way to head to Parliament, I took time to show my daughter the giant masterpiece painting of Jomo Kenyatta in handcuffs after his arrest, arraignment and conviction on charges of being a member of the Mau Mau freedom fighters.

Kenyatta and five comrades-in-arms were later detained for seven years from 1953 during the State of Emergency; and were driven on the rough road from Nairobi to Kapenguria town, in West Pokot County, some 413 Km North West of the capital city.

The other five were: Paul Ngei, Achieng Oneko, Fred Kubai, Bildad Kaggia and Kungu Karumba. After their release and indepedence in 1963, they all went into active politics with exception of Karumba who opted to carry on his business ventures and Kubai who was a trade unionist and later a Member of Parliament like Kaggia. As Prime Minister, Kenyatta appointed Ngei and Oneko to his first Cabinet.

Thanks to my sleek navy blue suit with matching shirt and white goatee, the security officers ushered us into KICC without asking us where we were going to and to produce our national identity card, as is the standard practice.

Looks Matter

I recalled Kibaki’s tenure at KICC as the first Executive Officer of the ruling party, Kenya African National Union (KANU) party, with founding President Mzee Jomo Kenyatta, as the national Chairman, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, as his vice-chairman, and Tom Mboya as the Secretary General.

As we exited the iconic building and stood by the stairs facing City Hall, since renamed Nairobi Governor’s Office, we could not miss staring in awe at the giant-size stature of Jomo Kenyatta seated, dressed in leopard skin and a matching headgear with his ceremonial walking stick and flywhisk, facing Parliament.

Those 20 or so steps at the entrance of KICC were historic; it is there that photo-journalists had a field day capturing and documenting who-is-who in the Kenyatta and later Moi governments as they posed before and after crucial meetings that shaped the political destiny of the nation.

We joined the queue of mourners heading to Parliament at the junction of Holy Family-Garden Square where we met young lady who had stood beside a plain-clothed police officer who ordered everyone who had a bag to turn back or leave it on the ground for security reasons.

When I asked him why we were not informed earlier, the officer just looked away as the lady opted to help us at a small fee by guarding it in our absence. We complied and exchanged our telephone numbers for communication later.

By 8.30am. traffic was building and the queue across the road next to Parliament building was getting longer near the closed gate to the founder of the nation’s mausoleum. Everyone was then frisked, asked to remove their belts, and then pass through the metal detectors.

From there, we all walked in a single file into the august House, where I had served as a Senior Parliamentary Reporter for Nation Media Group (NMG) for seven years from 2001, when Kibaki was the Official Leader of the Opposition and later as the third President.

From VP to Opposition Leader

Another stature of Jomo Kenyatta was conspicuous at the parking lot; he stood with one hand raised, wearing a leather jacket which he had worn while in detention in Kapenguria.

Once inside the iconic building built in the 1950s and expanded in the 1960s under the colonial rule, I fondly remembered the heated and humorous debates in the chamber as Kibaki defended the government as VP and Leader of Government Business; and later as the Official leader of the Opposition.

I had the honour to cover Kibaki several times as opposition Leader both in and outside Parliament. One of the most memorable was on the eve of Moi Day, a national day to commemorate the second President’s 10th year at the helm, when he called a press conference as chairman of Democratic Party, after defecting from KANU after he was dropped as VP and appointed Minister for Health by Moi.

I had asked him why he was lamenting about “waste of time and public resources” yet he was always supporting his boss to the hilt earlier on. Kibaki’s handlers were not amused and tried to intimidate me as they urged him to ignore that “useless question,” but the former VP would not shy away from responding. His answer was brief: “It’s only a fool who does not learn from his mistakes!”

Another encounter was at Uhuru Park in 1992 as DP’s presidential candidate against Kanu’s Moi, Ford Asili’s Stanley Njindo Matiba and Ford Kenya’s Odinga. His critics, especially in Kiambu, mocked him and his DP party referring it as “Dead Party!”

The historic rally, his first as opposition leader, resembled a Kanu rally in almost everything except name. Rumours had it that Moi, as the ‘Professor of Politics,’ had used his former VP to fight his biggest threat, Kiharu MP, Matiba, who had earlier served as a Cabinet Minister, to split the opposition vote and sail through back to State House.

On the eve of the 2002 General Elections, I did not cover Kibaki’s last presidential campaign rally at Nyayo National Stadium in Nairobi, when he ran for the presidency for the third time under National Rainbow Coalition (NARC) party.

Instead, I was assigned to cover Kanu’s presidential candidate, Uhuru Kenyatta, a stone’s throw away at Uhuru Park. Earlier on, I was part of the media team at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), where I had covered Kibaki’s trip from Nairobi Hospital where he had been in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and High Dependency Unit (HDU), following a tragic road accident at the junction of Machakos-Nairobi in Machakos County after a campaign rally in the region.

Midnight flight

The ambulance that he was driven in moved at a snail’s pace as police outriders and patrol cars gave him and his family maximum security with Langata MP, Raila Odinga, among the team that facilitated his entry and boarding of a British Airways midnight flight to London, the British capital, for specialized treatment and care.

On his return and swearing-in at Uhuru Park in 2003, I was again assigned to cover the handing over of power from Moi to Kibaki at State House Nairobi. I wrote a front-page news article that irked Kanu supporters and was applauded by Kibaki and his supporters.

The headline and introduction was: “Tears Flowed freely at State House as Moi flew out to start retirement; Sally Kosgei led Uhuru and Kanu leaders to bid him farewell.”

Mother of all blunders

I later covered Kibaki severally at State House and other state functions with one of the most embarrassing being a scene at a tree-planting ceremony in Kinale in Kiambu County on a Saturday afternoon when he was forced to rebuke his official driver by calling him “kumbafu, mavi ya kuku” because of a communication breakdown as he was addressing the meeting and a heavy downpour interrupted him forcing the transport, protocol and security team to cut short and reorganize the programme.

Another blunder was during an East African Community (EAC) Heads of State summit at State House Nairobi when after the entertainment session by choirs and musicians, the Master of ceremony invited President Kibaki to invite Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa and his Ugandan counterpart, Yuweri Museveni, to address the meeting.

But for some strange reason, Kibaki mixed up the names and left everyone watching helplessly. The two heads of state overlooked the blunder and the programme continued as earlier planned.

The Kibaki’s funeral committee did a splendid job, especially the photo exhibition section for the public to see the history of the man from Makerere University who rose to be the third President of the Republic.

The on-going construction of a Kshs72 billion 27Km. Nairobi Expressway, a flying highway on top of Mombasa Road and Uhuru Highway, from Mlolongo, in Machakos County, through the CBD to Westlands is another stark legacy of Kibaki’s Vision 2030 economic blue print on infrastructural development, jobs and wealth creation.

So, as I queued with fellow mourners at Parliament Building to see the “best President” that Kenya has ever had, according to his admirers, I could not help holding back tears from rolling down my cheeks for his illustrious career.

Go thee well go thee.

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Tribute by Terry Achieng

Yesterday was a great day for me. It was a great learning experience. With the death of retired President Kibaki, I thank God for the extent to which he served our country. Looking back, he played a tremendous part in my life. My childhood memory is filled with memories of his rein and I thank God. I also experienced God's faithfulness and favor knowing that I come from a country that has always been considered peaceful and stable in East Africa. May our former President’s soul soar into heaven eternally.