By Staff Reporter
NAIROBI: Former Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga has died at the age of 80, a source in Odinga’s office told Reuters on Wednesday, without giving further details.
Indian newspaper Mathrubhumi earlier reported that Odinga, who was undergoing treatment in the southern Indian city of Kochi, suffered a cardiac arrest on Wednesday and was rushed to hospital where he was pronounced dead.
As opposition leader, Odinga lost all five of his presidential campaigns, with two of the votes leading to chaotic bouts of bloodletting and recrimination a decade apart.
His work as a democracy activist over the years helped seal two of the country’s most important reforms: multiparty democracy in 1991 and a new constitution in 2010.
He led the protests after the disputed 2007 election that plunged the country into its most serious episode of political violence since independence. About 1,300 people were killed and hundreds of thousands displaced from their homes in the battles.
Source: Reuters
