He was Kenya’s first lawyer at a time when the British colonialists had turned the nation into their own, but still avoided associating with the local at the same time, bringing with them their own judges to judge the white and the black to argue their cases before jurors.
Born in 1923, in Nyawara, Gem in Siaya County, Kodhek was already giving the British headache at 34 and is said to have at some point taught retired President Daniel Moi as a lecturer in a Rift Valley institution.
In 1951, the first man to form a political party in Nairobi graduated from the prestigious Lincoln’s Inn University with a Barrister At Law, before returning to his motherland.
This was after he dropped out of the Makerere University where he had enrolled for teaching to do law.
He was later offered a job by the colonialist’s Law State Office but turned down the offer after being offered a salary thrice lower than his fellow black men, opting to join the Chanan Singh Advocates.
He later established his own private practice at Church House, Nairobi.
In 1963, he was elected the first ever lawmaker for Gem on the Independence Kenya African National Union (KANU) and also served as the Assistant Minister for Security and Defense.
On 26, January, 1969, Kodhek died in a mysterious accident along Kilimani Nairobi’s Argwings Kodhek Road, a road named after him.
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