2025 in Review: Kenya Loses Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga

By Kepher Otieno - Reporter

Kenya, 23 December 2025 - As the year draws to a close, the Odinga family is counting down not in celebration, but in quiet relief.

For a family long accustomed to public life and political struggle, the past twelve months have been defined not by rallies or resistance, but by grief that struck without warning.

The sudden death of ODM leader Raila Odinga stunned the family, leaving them grappling with shock, unanswered questions, and a silence far heavier than any political defeat they have known.

For a life built on endurance, the abruptness of his passing made the loss all the harder to bear.

Raila’s journey had been one of struggle, resistance, and resilience—a bridge between generations, carrying forward ideals inherited from the past while shaping visions of the future.

That such a life could end so suddenly left the family unprepared. There was no gradual farewell, no time to reconcile with the inevitable—only a void that turned an ordinary year into one they now wish to leave behind entirely.

Ruth Odinga, Raila’s sister, still struggles to reconcile herself with the rapidity of events.

“None of us expected it to come that fast,” she says, her words heavy with disbelief. To her, the year feels incomplete, broken into a before and after that can never be neatly joined.

The pain deepened when the family later lost their sister, Beryl Odinga.

For Dr Oburu Oginga, the double blow of losing both Raila and Beryl within the same period compounded his grief.

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He remembers the year with what he calls “sickening nostalgia,” where memory itself has become a burden—each recollection tied to absence, each familiar moment shadowed by loss.

“The coincidence of the two deaths feels cruel, almost unbearable,” he reflects.

Grief also sits quietly on Dr Ida Odinga, Raila’s widow. Her sorrow needs no explanation. It is written in her face, in her pauses, in her restraint. Where others speak, she reflects. Where others recall, she endures. Her pain embodies the most intimate loss—the sudden absence of a life partner, a confidant, and a constant presence. In her silence lies a testimony to love disrupted and a future reshaped without consent.

As a family, the Odingas do not seek to assign blame or find cold explanations.

They describe the events of the year as “the vagaries of nature” and surrender their questions to faith.

“We leave it to God,” they say collectively, acknowledging the limits of human understanding in the face of sudden death. This surrender is not resignation, but a coping mechanism—an act of trust where certainty has failed.

Looking ahead, their prayers are simple yet profound. They ask not for restitution or replacement, but for peace, love, and tranquility. These are not abstract wishes; they are necessities for a family trying to heal while carrying a public legacy. As they prepare to cross into a new year, they do so with hope tempered by loss, believing that “the new year will come with God’s blessings.”

In the end, this year will be remembered not for politics or triumphs, but for what it revealed: the fragility of even the strongest lives, the limits of preparation, and the shared humanity beneath public stature.

For the Odinga family, moving forward is less about forgetting and more about surviving—carrying memory without being crushed by it, and trusting that time, faith, and grace will soften what this year made unbearably hard.