HOW ODINGAS HAVE CONTROLLED LUOS FOR DECADES AND TAKEN THEM FOR FOOLS. Sometimes back, a victory ceremony for a successful candidate in Nyanza ended in chaos after a rowdy section of the gathering disagreed with the presiding priest who thanked God in his opening remarks for the victory of the host. The agitated mob complained that the priest was giving credit where it was not due.According to them,the candidate had won elections not by the grace of God,but because of “Agwambo”.They demanded,therefore,that the priest thank “Agwambo” in prayers instead of God Almighty threatening to beat up the priest and to disrupt the ceremony if their directive was not complied with. Such is the state of affairs in some parts of Luoland today that inspite of the proliferation of churches in the region there is a frightening decline in religious practice as well as ignrance of religious culture and relativism among the younger generation because of the increasing influence of political leaders who are deeply steeped in pagan rituals and who believe not in GOD but in the forces of darkness and the worship of Baal. Matters have not been helped by some Luo priests and religious heads who are demanding today that for the faithful to qualify for sacrament,baptism of their children or requiem mass for the repose of their souls upon death,they must be supporters of the dominant political class which does not believe in God. Consequently,nowhere in the country today is the image of the church more damaged than in Luoland where faithful are already opting to quit in disgust leaving behind a church of Christ that resembles a boat which is leaking in water on every side and which is on the verge of sinking. By inadvertently shifting their allegiance from GOD to the section of unbelieving devil worshiping political class,leading priests in Luoland have taken after the Jews of Jesus’ time who cheered criminals while mocking those of integrity among them. As the church of Christ loses its grip in Luoland,the political leadership through the worship of Baal has increasingly turned to the world of abracadabra to maintain its stranglehold on the helpless community.After the general elections of 2012,a 68 years old man called Christianus Tobias Ogutu Ongara from Kanyamwa in Ndhiwa Constituency,Homa Bay County,confessed before church officials led by Bishop John Okinda of Migori Worship Center that he had assisted most Luo MPs to win their seats through magical powers from hell.He told a bewildered congregation that he assisted some Luo MPs to win their seats through witchcraft adding that most of them went to parliament through magical powers”. Ongara,who gave his life to Jesus that day before Bishop Okinda,surrendered his paraphernalia which included a tortoise shell,human limbs,dried male genitals and dried leaves all of which were later doused in petrol and set ablaze in the church compound. The old man said he got the human limbs and male genitals from mortuary attendants adding that it was an easy job “since families of the deceased often fear dead bodies and delegate the job of dressing them to mortuary attendants”. It is also common knowledge in Luo Nyanza that Luo political leaders make frequent clandestine pilgrimage to “Sumbwawanga and Bariati” which are the twin capitals of witchcraft in Tanzania. Belief in the powers of magic as opposed to divine intervention among leading members of Luo political class dates back to the days of Jaramogi Oginga during his fierce battle for supremacy and dominance in Luoland with Walter Odede and later Tom Mboya,both of whom were devout christians with no time for the occult and magicians.In 1968 at the peak of his political problems with Tom Mboya and the Government,Odinga contracted the help of soothsayers-cu-magicians from West Africa. According to Oginde Odera,his former aide and speech writer in a recent book entitled,”My journey with Jaramogi”,the magician Oginda brought in was “a Senegalese,a technical man”,who had been secretly brought into the country courtesy of Dr.Milton Obote,the president of Uganda,to assist Jaramogi overcome the difficulties he was experiencing with the leadership of KANU and the government.”The technical man” with his two assistants was lodged at a self-service apartment at Hurlingham,Nairobi where Jaramogi conferred with him several times for one week and later in Kisumu. Over one decade after this incident,Odinge Odera witnessed yet another encounter between Jaramogi and another soothsayer-cum-magician.He also narrates this in his book,”My journey with Jaramogi” that; “About ten days before the abortive coup by the personnel of the Kenya Airforce on August 1,1982,i paid a courtesy call on Jaramogi at his Kisumu lakeside home”. “With him was a mzee he introduced as a friend from one of the islands of Rusinga and Mfangano on Lake Victoria.My presence made the man somewhat nervous until Jaramogi reassured him that he needed not worry about my presence.He then requested Jaramogi if he could start his ceremony. “The mzee had paraphernalia which he had spread out on the floor and which he glanced at from time to time as he talked.At some point he told Jaramogi; “You see,i am seeing plenty of blood and dead bodies of people scattered in Nairobi”.He was not interupted while he kept murmuring and muttering in a low and deep tone,as if possessed by unseen forces.He went into some kind of seance. He then sat up suddenly and when he had sufficiently recovered,he addressed Jaramogi,”Mzee there is likelihood of some kind of trouble in the country in the near future but you will not be in any mortal danger.” Ten days later there was bloodshed in Nairobi when junior Airforce officers staged an abortive coup de tat. From the above it goes without saying that Odinga was a firm believer in soothsayers,magicians and other demonic elements.With his increased influence in Luoland especially aftrer the death of Tom Mboya in 1969 and Walter Odede in 1947,the political dispensation subservient to him rose at the expence of Christianity which quickly subordinated itself to the new political class deeply steeped in magic,divination and Baal worship. In his book,”Not yet Uhuru”,Jaramogi confessed that he did not take Christianity seriously.He wrote; “I was fascinated by the admonitions to godliness and charity towards others but my religious understanding and personal sacrifice to God and Christ were limited.When i was called to baptism,i took the occasion lightly.My evangelist teachers had asked me to select a god father and godmother but i did nothing about this nor did i arrange a baptismal name and when the day came and i was called to the altar i could produce no name and no godparents were present.Canon Pleydell had come to baptise us and he said “go out in front of that large crowd and look for your godmother and godfather! Iwas at loss.Stephen Machial and Loise Amolo wife of Shadrack Osewe came forward on the spot and gave me names Obadiah and Adonijah.I was called to the altar and baptized but i never like the names; I never used them though it was important in those days to be known by your baptismal name if you were a christian.” Many of Odingas political supporters subsequently took after him by also discarding their baptism names and giving the church a wide berth except during campaigns when they would make technical appearances ostensibly to pray but in actual sense to canvas for votes before disappearing in the dens of magicians for nocturnal “technical appearances”. Over the years,the majority of the political class in Luoland has become addicted to soothsayers and magicians to the extent that many of them attribute their elective positions not to the electrorate,but to pagan rituals and other forces of darkness through which they believe that the populace can be blindfolded and held captive forever.
Posted on: Wed, 26 Nov 2014 02:00:41 +0000
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