Candidate wins seat after 22 years of struggle

By Dann Okoth

KENYA: Was it a case of fifth time lucky, or was it a case of differed justice—granted at last—when Mr James Onyango K’Oyoo, the perennial parliamentary contender in Muhoroni Constituency strode to victory on Tuesday night.

This was the culmination of a journey spreading over 22 treacherous years. K’Oyoo polled 29, 964, to win the Muhoroni seat against Education assistant minister Ayiecho Olweny who got 16,089, Barasa Edward Opiyo and Jonathan Ogada who polled 569 and 519 respectively.

The trouncing of Prof Olweny wasn’t just absolute—it was sweet in every sense of the word. In contrast Olweny is K’Oyoo’s blood relative (his uncle to be precise)—and it is the former MP and a band of political henchmen, coalescing around the Odinga’s that have frustrated K’Oyoo’s political ambitions since 1991.

So was it poetic justice that K’Oyoo prevailed over Olweny, this time, especially after Orange House gave the latter the nomination certificate when indeed the former had prevailed at the ODM primaries beating his opponent by 13,000 votes against 3, 500?

But the MP elect who was only in his early 40’s when he first vied for the seat is a huge beneficiary of coalition politics which created an avenue for primary poll losers to seek alternative escape route through other parties—a development analysts say has opened up political party democracy in the country and exposed party autocracy.

Koyoo would embark on a rat-race between Orange House and several party headquarters scattered across the country—in a last minute dash to acquire nomination—before he finally obtained the certificate with a little-known People’s Democratic Party (PDP) led by former South Mugirango MP Omingo Magara.

“The officials at Orange House engaged me in cat-and-mouse games throughout the day on the last day even though the chairman of ODM Election Board Mr Franklin Bett had promised to give me the certificate,” he claims. “I was desperate not to let Muhoroni people down this time so I cast my net wider—scouring the other parties for a nomination chance.”

 “The certificate was handed to me at midnight on the last day and again it was a race against time to deposit it with the IEBC, but I am glad everything went well,” he says.

But K’Oyoo is no stranger to intrigues, especially those that have ensured he fitted the bill of a popular leader that never led since 1992. His biggest political undoing, however, is that while he has often subscribed to the political ideology and wave of the Odinga’s, starting with the late Jaramogi Oginga Odinga and now his son Raila Odinga—he never quite measured up when it came to the high stakes games in the homestretch.

Multiparty politics

It all started in 1992 during the advent of multiparty politics when K’oyoo whose ideologies and policies resonated with the electorate would lose the parliamentary nominations to then political novice Aloo Ogeka, as conspiratory agendas dogged what would have been a generational change in Luo Nyanza’s politics.

The schemes were triggered when former Kanu stalwarts in Nyanza like former regional development minister Onyango Midika, former Nyando MP Miruka Owuor, former Bondo and Muhoroni MP Odongo Omamo and former Nyakach MP Ojwang Kombudo crossed over to Ford Kenya and warmed up to Jaramogi who was the party’s presidential candidate on Ford-Kenya ticket in that year’s election.

At the time Kanu still had strong political connections in Nyanza and the likes of Midika who was the party’s secretary general in Kisumu District held a lot of sway in the ensuing political mobilisation of the region as the opposition wave swept through the region.

Midika who had succeeded the late Dr Robert Ouko in the Regional Development docket after the latter was appointed Foreign Affairs Minister in the late 1980s, is understood to have used his Cabinet connections, especially the Provincial Administration through the then powerful Internal Security PS Hezekiah Oyugi to establish a foothold in the Nyanza grassroots politics. However Ford-Kenya being worry of former Kanu henchmen infiltrating their ranks, tactically sidelined most of them, with Dennis Akumu a staunch Jaramogi ally, and Ford-Kenya Director of Elections, fronting for Ogeka.

As fate would have it the 1992 Muhoroni Ford-Kenya parliamentary primaries would pit K’Oyoo against Midika, Ogeka, Walter Adel and Akumu Ndedi. He won with over 60 per cent of the vote. Come 1997 and K’Oyoo again beat Olweny by securing more than 70 per cent of the votes in the primaries, but in a dramatic turn of events William Odongo Omamo who was contesting the elections on a Kanu ticket crossed over to Liberal Democratic Party at the last-minute and was given the certificate. He tried again in 2002, but the matrix worked in his disfavour, especially because he was standing on a Kanu ticket and the Narc euphoria was strong. K’Oyoo did not contest in 2007 –interestingly Omulo Okal who won the ODM primaries was denied the certificate and instead Olweny was declared the winner.