Raila Odinga’s first anniversary remembrance will unfold on two separate tracks, with his family and the ODM Party organising separate candle-lighting ceremonies.
ODM will kick off its “Mwezi wa Baba” programme on Friday with a nationwide candle-lighting exercise.
A week later, on October 8, Raila’s widow Ida Odinga will lead a separate candle-lighting ceremony at Kang’o ka Jaramogi in Bondo, where the former Prime Minister was buried beside his father, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga.
The family event will begin at 6pm East Africa Time and has been designated the official international candle-lighting by the Raila Amolo Odinga Memorial National Steering Committee chaired by Prof Adams Oloo.
The family has invited Kenyans and Raila supporters across the world to light candles at the same hour in his memory.
The separate ceremonies come as ODM rolls out a month-long programme to commemorate its founder and longtime leader.
The party will hold a major memorial rally in Kakamega on October 9, bringing together supporters from Kakamega, Vihiga, Busia, Bungoma and Trans Nzoia.
Family activities will follow from October 10 to 15 before the Bondo memorial, while ODM’s programme will continue with events in Garissa on October 17 and the Coast on October 18 and 19.
Despite organising separate events, the family has endorsed ODM’s Friday vigil.
“We welcome this kind gesture of remembrance and the committee gives its blessings to the planned event,” Oloo said.
The parallel programmes give Raila’s first anniversary a distinctive political and family dimension, with ODM and the Odinga family each running their own remembrance calendar around a figure whose political legacy shaped Kenya’s opposition politics for decades.
