'Thank you Baba!': A tribute to departed Raila Odinga

I write to you today with a heavy heart and a full chest, heavy because the country has lost one of its most relentless voices for change, and full because I remember the good you did for the common mwananchi.

You were many things to many people: a son of Kenya’s political struggles, a tireless campaigner for democracy, and for millions of ordinary Kenyans, hope. You stood in the hot glare of our politics when it was easier to walk away. You paid the price: detention, insults, betrayals and broken promises along the road. Yet you kept returning to the same fight, for a more open, fair Kenya. That doggedness mattered. It changed our politics. It changed us. 

I’m not writing to turn you into an icon without faults, history will judge that fully, but to thank the part of you that served the very common mwananchi. You were central to the struggle that opened Kenya from one-party rule into a multiparty space where voices could be heard and voted for. You pushed and pushed until the idea of a new constitution became not a dream but law. For many of us, the 2010 Constitution was a promise finally given shape: rights, separation of powers, devolved governance however the challenges so far, things ordinary people could name and hold to. For that alone, you left us something that will keep working even when men and women change. 

You also carried the burdens of leadership in the darkest hours. After the violence of the 2007–2008 crisis, you accepted a unity that stopped the country sliding further into chaos and helped steady Kenya in uncertain times. Millions breathed easier because you stepped into the hard place and chose a path that saved lives. That kind of public courage, uncomfortable, costly, and necessary, is part of the best of your legacy. 

What many of us will remember most is how you made politics feel like it could be about us again. In Kibera, in villages, in market stalls, people saw in you someone who would shout for fairness, someone who would name grievance and press for change. You inspired youth, activists, and ordinary citizens to stand up and demand a say. You made it harder for power to pretend it had no witnesses. That is not small. That is the work of re-making a civic culture. 

Baba, we are grieving. But we are also grateful. Grateful that a man tired in his bones kept going; grateful that a long fight helped us win important protections; grateful that generations who follow will inherit a Kenya with tools to contest power. The nation will argue about the compromises you made, and it should. Democracy is messy and memory must be honest. But today, on behalf of many citizens from the grassroots, who never had a platform to say thank you, I simply say: THANK YOU BABA for not letting us give up on wanting a better Kenya.

May your rest be peaceful, and may the work you helped start be carried forward by a people who now know better what to ask, how to organize, and why they must keep vigil. For the young ones who may now doubt the value of fighting for rights, let your story remind them that courage does matter and that change, however slow, is possible.

As a country we mourn. As a people we remember. As citizens we will try, in our imperfect way,  to honor the good you offered us by refusing to be quiet, by insisting on fairness, and by using the freedoms you helped secure.

Rest in power, Baba.

Yours in sorrow and hope,

Sebastian Karani Asava.