Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga. [Photo/nation.co.ke]
When he finally hangs his boots and sits down to pen a comprehensive account of his tumultuous political career, the series of betrayals he suffered in the hands of politicians --some of whom were members of his inner circle – will doubtless feature highly if not highest in that yet-to-be-written memoir.
Appearing on Churchill Live, a mainstream comedy in Kenya, sometime back, Raila revealed that ‘’Kigeugeu’’ by Jaguar, the musician turned politician, was his most favorite song much to the amusement of viewers.
It is not hard to see why this chart-topping tune resonated deeply with the veteran opposition leader.
The revelation was made in the build-up to the 2013 elections after scores of his political allies had left him for the then Jubilee coalition, chief among them William Ruto who is widely seen as the kingmaker who made a Uhuru presidency possible.
In 2017, Raila Odinga suffered betrayal again that eerily echo 2013.
Isaac Rutto, a principal in the NASA coalition, abandoned Mr. Odinga and publicly declared his support for Uhuru Kenyatta after the August 8 elections.
Peter Munya who had appeared with Odinga in a press conference to announce that he had joined NASA pulled off a 180 within days and joined Jubilee.
Former Mombasa senator and a staunch Odinga ally, Omar Hassan, left NASA and joined Jubilee and started firing brutal criticisms at the NASA top brass.
Ababu Namwamba an ODM stalwart who had vowed to single-handedly deliver the presidency to Raila eventually joined Jubilee and started attacking him at every opportunity.
Paul Otuoma also followed suit and abandoned him and joined the ranks of Jubilee.
2017 is arguably the year that Odinga suffered the greatest betrayal given the scale of loss of support from former allies.
One is tempted to characterise the loss as a mass exodus.