Baba: Politician who schooled a nation

Born to a teacher and married to another, Raila Odinga’s life has always been intertwined with education even when his platform was the political stage rather than the classroom.

His father, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, began his career as a teacher in Maseno, his mother, Mary Juma Odinga was a primary school teacher while his wife, Ida Odinga, spent her early adult life years teaching English and Literature.

However, Ida lost her job at Kenya High School in September 1988, while Raila was in exile, a year after his release from detention in 1987. Her dismissal led to her eviction from the school’s staff quarters, an exercise supervised by police officers.

While that marked Raila’s early link to education, he would later deepen his influence in the sector over the next three decades, from championing philanthropic campaigns to advocating for education reforms.

The longtime opposition leader has hugely shaped public debate, from calling for free university education to demanding the devolution of schools and greater funding accountability.

Raila’s earliest major contribution to education came in 2006 with the establishment of the Raila Odinga Foundation.

Six years later, the foundation launched a Sh300 million scholarship and mentorship programme to support bright but needy students from marginalised communities.

“We are now formally establishing the Raila Odinga Centre (ROC) to mobilise resources and promote integration among students in the East African Community. In other words, we want to expand the scope and give children in Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania a holistic education that enables them to achieve their potential,” he said during the launch in Nairobi in November 2011.

Five years later, in October 2016, Raila inaugurated the Raila Education Centre in Kibra, a learning institution designed to help slum youth access training and mentorship opportunities.

The facility, located in the heart of Kibera, is equipped with classrooms, laboratories and digital learning spaces.

While these two initiatives mark Raila’s most tangible contributions to the education sector, his views and public pronouncements have also greatly influenced education policy and debate.

When the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) was introduced in 2017 and met with widespread criticism over poor planning, Raila took a different stance.

He threw his weight behind the CBC, urging Kenyans to give it a chance, arguing that it was better aligned with the demands of the modern job market.

In October 2021, he publicly defended then Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha during a political rally in Nyando, saying the CBC would “rescue Kenya’s education from over reliance on rote learning.”

Raila’s long-standing advocacy for free education also aligned with the vision of his political ally, President Mwai Kibaki, who introduced free primary education in 2003.

During the 2022 presidential campaign, Raila pledged to make education free and compulsory from primary to university level, promising to fund it through rationalised spending and an intensified fight against corruption.

“No parent should sell land to take a child to college,” he often declared on the campaign trail.

Although the pledge was met with skepticism, it elevated education to a central campaign issue.

Contentious proposal

His most contentious proposal, however, came later when he called for the devolution of primary and secondary education.

The idea, presented during the 2025 Devolution Conference, would place the management of schools under county governments.

“We cannot run schools from Nairobi and expect efficiency. Governors must take charge,” he told delegates. The proposal triggered strong protests and backlash from teachers’ unions and other education stakeholders, who warned it could disrupt national standards and oversight.

This was not Raila’s first push to devolve basic education; he had made a similar proposal in 2020, which also met stiff resistance.

After losing the 2022 election, Raila remained steadfast in demanding accountability and proper funding for education.

In January 2024, he accused the Ruto administration of delaying the disbursement of billions in capitation funds, saying public schools were being crippled by empty promises.

Similarly, in 2025, he accused the government of “starving schools” and warned that the free education programme risked collapse.