Moi's Young Girl Friend

...and The older Mzungu one who went public.

In the last days of the Moi Administration this writer's informant was trying to set up a publishing business in Nairobi and therefore build a sizeable stable of fairly reliable providers of leads for stories and information. The idea was to ensure that his newspaper got off to a flying start with a steady and constant flow of good stories.

One of his sources was a frustrated man who had previously served in the President's think tank that helped win him the first multiparty general elections in 1992 and was still a frequent visitor to State House Nairobi. He provided information and proof for a very big story, but sadly my writer friend could not dare touch it.

The story revolves around the mystery of a very pretty Asian woman who frequented State House Nairobi. It was said that the woman was the President's lover.

About two years after President Moi's retirement, a woman of European origin testifying in the parliamentary select committee inquiry into former foreign Minister Robert Ouko's murder claimed that she had been the fromer President's lover. The former president vehemently denied the allegations.

If both stories were true then it says a lot about the former president's taste as far as women are concerned.

The former President was separated from his wife Lena Moi (now deceased) and this naturally left him vulnerable to all sorts of situations and it is not surprising that there were many rumours doing the rounds in Nairobi throughout his tenure. One particular hilarious one posed the question why there were so many girls' schools named after the former president and hardly any boys schools apart from his very own Kabarak High School set up at his farm, which was a mixed school anyway.

It is instructive that through out President Moi's tenure women did not feature in his political plans at all. The President and Kanu's view of women at the time was not only plain old fashioned but dangerously so. Especially when you consider the very important role played by women in Africa over the last decades. Most African economies would simply collapse if women withdraw enmasse from their activities.

In other words if Moi's comeback into politics is successful, then it will be two steps backwards for the Kenyan woman who has struggled long and hard to come a long way to where she is today.

Do not be fooled by the fact that one of the Kanu candidates being supported by the former president in the forthcoming by-elections for the North Horr constituency is a woman, the widow of the immediate former MP of the area Dr Bonaya Godana, Mrs Sarah Godana. This is a classic case of political inheritance promoted aggressively and perfected by Moi throughout his 24 year tenure. But that is a story for another day.