opposition leader Raila Odinga has died in India, Indian police said Wednesday. He was aged 80.
Odinga died of a heart attack, according to the Associated Press news agency, which cited the Devamatha Hospital in India’s Kerala State. The news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported that Odinda died during a “health visit” to the South Asian nation.
Indian police told AFP he was walking with his sister, daughter, and a personal doctor “when he suddenly collapsed.”
Often described as Kenya’s most influential opposition figure, Odinga spent more than three decades at the heart of the nation’s political transitions, championing multi-party democracy, challenging entrenched power, and negotiating peace in moments of deep national crisis.
Born January 7, 1945, in Maseno, Kisumu County, in western Kenya, Raila was the son of Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, a leading figure in who later became the country’s first vice president.
Raila’s early schooling was at Kisumu Union Primary, then Maranda High School. In 1965, he won a scholarship to study in the , East Germany, during the .
By 1970, he had graduated with an engineering diploma (roughly equivalent to a master’s) in mechanical engineering.
After returning home, Raila worked briefly as a lecturer at the University of Nairobi and later at the Kenya Bureau of Standards.
He also launched a manufacturing venture, Standard Processing Equipment Construction & Erection (later East African Spectre), dealing in LPG cylinders and related apparatus.
Early political career and the advent of multi-partyism
Raila’s political life was deeply shaped by the fraught politics of Kenya’s KANU one-party era in the 1980s. He was often arrested and detained without trial for his multi-party activism.
Over time, he gravitated into organized opposition. In 1992, he was elected as a member of parliament (Langata constituency), marking his formal entry into national politics.
In 1997, Odinga made his first presidential bid, finishing third behind President Daniel arap Moi and Mwai Kibaki.
He later formed the National Development Party (NDP) after leaving FORD–Kenya, where he had clashed with other opposition leaders following the death of his father, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga.
With his charm and political wit, he united opposition parties to form the National Rainbow Coalition (NARC), which eventually saw Kibaki ascend to the presidency in 2002.
Between 2003 and 2005, Raila served in Kibaki’s government as minister of roads, public works and housing, but cracks soon emerged between the two, and Raila returned to the opposition fold.
His defining political moment came in the disputed 2007 presidential election. Polls and exit surveys suggested Raila had the support of large segments of the electorate, but the Electoral Commission declared Mwai Kibaki the winner.
Widespread protests erupted, and post-election violence left over 1,000 dead and hundreds of thousands displaced. In the face of a national crisis, an internationally mediated pact spearheaded by the late UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, led to a power-sharing deal. Raila became prime minister in a grand coalition from 2008 to 2013.
The unlucky presidential contestant
Even as prime minister, Odinga remained tethered to opposition culture. After the role of prime minister was abolished in the 2010 constitutional referendum, he returned to full opposition.
He contested the presidency again in 2013, 2017 (in which he withdrew from a repeat election), and 2022, and in each case fell short.
In 2013, he challenged Uhuru Kenyatta in court, alleging electoral malpractice, but the Supreme Court ruled against him.
under the Azimio la Umoja coalition with Martha Karua as running mate, but . Again, he in the Supreme Court but lost.
Raila’s mixed legacy
Raila’s long tenure in opposition brought both reverence and criticism. Accusations often surfaced that he exploited ethnic mobilization, especially with Luo identity as a core base, and that his rhetoric sometimes deepened polarization.
Still, his role as elder statesman grew in later years. In 2025, President William Ruto dispatched him to mediate the simmering crisis in South Sudan, a signal of recognition for his diplomatic efforts even from political rivals.
He also pursued regional ambitions. In 2024, he announced a bid for the presidency of the African Union Commission, but he eventually lost to Djibouti’s Mahamoud Ali Youssouf.
Raila Odinga’s life has been hailed as a study in tenacity. Though he never became Kenya’s president, he is credited with pushing for the democratic rights many Kenyans enjoy today.
Edited by: Chrispin Mwakideu
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