The life and career of one of Kenya's most controversial politicians,
Raila Amolo Odinga, was only saved by a legal technicality after the
failed 1982 coup.
Raila was among dozens of people picked up and detained by police in the
wake of the coup attempt in August. His name had cropped up in the initial
interrogation of the Kenya Air Force personnel suspected to be at the
heart of the plot to topple the government.
And although President Moi sought to portray himself as a "forgiving and
compassionate Christian", it was generally believed, and later borne out
in fact, that the inner core of the coup plotters would be put to death.
Like other suspected mutineers, Raila was charged with the capital offence
of treason six weeks after his arrest. The State's case against Odinga
drew mainly from the confessions of the 12 soldiers who had been involved
in the conception and execution of the coup plot.
In one such confession, signed by Sgt Joseph Ogiddy Obuon in Court Martial
Criminal Appeal No. 3 of 1983, Obuon stated, in his defence, that he had
known nothing about the coup but had been ordered by superior officers to
report to a house on Ngong Road to guard communication equipment. There,
he said, he had found Raila.
"I had carried two servicemen in the Land Rover," Sgt Obuon said. "I drove
to Council Headquarters where the servicemen were supposed to guard. I had
carried them from KAF Eastleigh. S/Pvte Ochuka went away and came back
again.
"We then stayed for a while and again S/Pvte Ochuka left accompanied by
Raila Odinga," he continued. "They did not come back. Raila had two cars,
so he and Ochuka left in one of them and later SSgt Oteyo and the
journalist left in the other car, saying they were going to look for Raila
and Ochuka so that they can arrange how to announce at the Voice of Kenya
about the coup.
"They also never came back," he added. "It was now almost 7 am, and by
that time I had heard over the radio that the armed forces had taken over
the government."
But although the government, through Attorney-General Joseph Kamere, had
been determined to pursue a conviction for treason, their efforts were
scuttled by a major legal gaffe by the A-G, according to some legal
experts.
Kenya's Criminal Procedure Code is explicit that, in matters of treason,
evidence proffered by accomplices needs to be corroborated by at least two
independent witnesses.
In Raila's case, therefore, all the witnesses the state had hoped to line
up to testify were members of the Kenya Air Force and thus were not only
accomplices, but were themselves in detention pending prosecution.
Cognisant that it would be impossible for the state to secure a
conviction, then Chief Justice A.H. Simpson wrote to both President Moi
and the AG advising that it would be imprudent to proceed with the
prosecution. Judge Simpson, a Kenyan of British origin, also drew
attention to the fact that there was growing disquiet at the time,
particularly in Britain, over the mass arrests and reports of torture that
followed the coup attempt. In his view, prosecuting Raila would reflect
badly on the government if the law were cast aside to secure convictions.
Chastised, the AG withdrew the case but an attempt to bring a Bill to
Parliament to alter the relevant law was dropped following an outcry.
Mr Kamere was, unsurprisingly, dropped shortly afterwards and replaced by
Mathew Guy Muli.
The government then decided to prosecute the soldiers through
courts-martial while civilian suspects were detained without trial.
Recalling his arrest and detention last week, Raila was emphatic that his
survival was not an act of magnanimity by President Moi. "I spent six
weeks in custody before I was charged. I was interrogated, tortured and
moved to various police stations."
Upon his arrest, Raila was held at Central Police Station, Kilimani,
Muthangari and GSU headquarters. At Muthangari, he was kept in a cell
flooded with cold water and sealed with rubber. "It was very cold," he
said.
Raila says at Muthangari, he saw Titus Adungosi, the Students Organisation
of Nairobi University chairman who had been detained for leading his
colleagues into the streets to celebrate the short-lived coup.
"He told me they wanted him to make a confession, but I told him to remain
strong and not surrender. But eventually I think he gave in. They beat him
so badly that they broke his ribs and punctured his lungs. When we met at
Kamiti, he was continuously vomiting blood. Eventually he died."
Raila was shuttled between various stations, all the while being taken to
Criminal Investigations Department Headquarters and Special Branch for
interrogations and back to the cell.
"I was moved to the General Service Unit (GSU) headquarters at Ruaraka,
where I stayed for four weeks. I was subjected to intense interrogation by
Ben Gethi (a former Commissioner of Police) mostly at night. He really
tortured us," Raila recalled.
Eventually, Raila was taken to court and charged with treason together
with Prof Alfred Oduor, then a lecturer at the University of Nairobi, and
Otieno MakOnyango, a journalist with the East African Standard who was
mistaken for another journalist that had escaped.
"I was to be tried for treason. To ensure I was punished, the Government
tried to change the Criminal Procedure Pode. In between someone said,
'There is sufficient evidence to put you on your defence.' That never came
to pass as Raila spent six months at Kamiti awaiting trial or acquittal.
Guilllotine
Raila says that contrary to the belief that it was President Moi's
magnanimity that spared him the guillotine, it was the arrival of Desmond
D'Silva, a Queen's Counsel from the United Kingdom, to take over his
defence that changed the course. "Friends and well wishers raised funds
and hired a QC for my defence. Then followed a two-week adjournment as my
lawyer examined the committal bundles. It is then that the Government
realised the evidence it had gathered would not stand scrutiny before
court.
Raila was released but immediately re-arrested, locked up at Lang'ata
police station and subsequently handed a detention order. He was released
five years later in February 1988.
Looking back at the events leading to 1982, Raila recalled that the brutal
manner in which the government scuttled, and suppressed pro-democracy
forces including an earlier attempt by Jaramogi Oginga to launch a
political party left the movements without a viable alternative. This
drove the opposition underground. "Then came 1982," he says, "But before
1982 there was a massive crackdown on perceived dissidents. The police
arrested and tortured hundreds. We were several groups operating
clandestinely at the time. There was a group whose task was just to
produce leaflets called Pambana to sensitise the public about the
movement. "We engaged in mass production of the pamphlets, mainly by
photocopying. Both photocopying and distribution of the pamphlets were
done at night. In Nairobi we would spend about two hours at night dropping
them at strategic points."
Initially, they used facilities owned by Raila's relative with whom they
fell out. "Later, we used an airlines' facilities at Jomo Kenyatta
International Airport to do our work. In the morning people would pick up
the leaflets scattered all over town. Then for the rest of the day they
would excitedly talk about the leaflets' contents. But the pamphleteering
was purely a civilian thing. It had nothing to do with the military,"
Raila says.
"We were organised, but then there were also a number of other clandestine
groups we were working with that were more spontaneous than organised.
These are the activities that informed 1982. But again, there was also
discontent in the military. To a large extent, what upsets civilians also
tends to upset the military. Discontent outside almost always affects the
mood in the Barracks."
Raila would recollect that over the years, the democratisation struggle
has taken different turns at different times. "It's continuous," he
observes, "But there have always been two forces fighting, forces parallel
to each other. There have been forces hell-bent on retaining the status
quo and those that have always pushed for democratic reforms. These two
forces have been pulling in two diametrically opposed directions. It is
against this background that one can understand the liberation movement in
Kenya."
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