THE POLITICAL PROFILE OF KASIPUL-KABONDO CONSTITUENCY, AN AGRICULTURALLY RICH REGION WHICH COULD SERVE AS A BASTON OF MASSIVE FOOD PRODUCTION IN SOUTHERN NYANZA.

By Leo Odera Omolo In Oyugis Town.
Sunday 20th December,2009

KISUPUL-Kabondo constituency is another potential area in the greater Southern Nyanza region ,which could be developed to be an economic hub of Luo-Nyanza.

The land, the weather and rainfall is favorable for the production of food grains, both for domestic and cash crops.

The region has a very attractive rainfall pattern and blessed with red-soil, which is conducive for the production of cash crops such as coffee, tea, pineapples, sweet potatoes, fruits, vegetable, ground -nuts, bananas ,sorghum, onions and other crops.

Residents are said to be workaholics, and spend most of their valuable times working on their farms. Thanks goes to their former MP, the late Samuel Onyango Ayodo, who during his early stages of parliamentary representation of the area, had faced lot of difficulties, preaching  to his constituents the need to change  from the negative attitudes, towards farming, and to adopt the spirit of hard work and sweat, so that they could be able to reap the fruits of Uhuru {independence}.

The former MP used to tease his followers, especially members of KANU youth wingers, not to rush into attending his public rallies, before tending to their family farms in the morning. At times, the former MP’s gospel, and his persistent call for hard work, made him became so unpopular with the youths, who branded him, and called him names. But Rao Radhianja {Hippopotamus} was not deterred.[ Hippopotamus’ was his first election symbol in 1963}.

But those few among his constituents, who positively responded to his teachings and calls, are today the ones who are reaping the fruits of independence, in the real sense of the word. Today, anyone driving along the Sondu-Oyugis main road, would probably see small farms with good layout and fully cultivated food grains production.

In Kabondo area, one sees a lot of pineapples displayed by farmers for sale to the traveling passengers, at the Chabera  junction, Nyapalo and Namba Misambi, Kadongo, Ringa Ober and Oyugis Town. The former MP has since died, but left the living legend of constructive and productive politics, which has changed his former constituency from small farming of subsistence to well cultivate farms, with cash crops.

The residents of Kasipul-Kabondo are the descendants of one ancestor, the great Rachuonyo and cousins to their neighbors in Karachuonyo constituency.

For many years during the colonial rule, Kasipul Kabondo was governed as one administrative location, but today it has several divisions with 20 locations in Kasipul itself, and seven extra administrative locations on the Kabondo side.

Immediately after establishing its administrative bridgehead after military expedition in Kisii, where they met with the stiffest armed resistance from one sub-clan called  Wanjare {To-day the Bonchari constituency} Kisii, the British administrators of the time separated the Kasipul residents  from their cousins in Karachuonyo, and established the area as one administrative unit. They appointed one famous medicine man, Oyugi Wuon Bala as the first colonial chief in 1907.

Oyugi was replaced by one chieftain, Omiti from the Jo-Konyango sub-clan. He too ruled briefly and was replaced by another person from Jo-Konyango sub-clan called Owili. This chief is said to have encountered a lot of problems with his Konyango sub-clansmen.

He later abdicated and went into exile in an area called Milambo {South}, where he died while living in exile. He was replaced by another chief Auma Ogalo from Kachieng’ sub-clan, as the fourth chief, who is reputed to have ruled for only six  months, and then came Chief Obewa from Kotieno, in the western part of Kasipul.

The rapid sacking of five administrative chiefs within the spell of twenty years is a clear evidence that Kasipula-Kabondo was a difficult area for the colonizers to administer, and perhaps needed a genius and tough person to do the job.

But in 1927, the Colonialists felt something was a miss with the administration of this location. And in 1927, the colonialists identified one ex-soldier during the First World War in the name of Cpl Gideon Magak, who was one of the orderlies at the Kisii D.C.’s Office, and appointed him the new chief of Kasipul and Kabondo, combined as one administrative unit.

The new chief, who was a huge and strongly built tall man, embarked on draconian rule. People found smoking bhang in groups were rounded up and sent to jail. The same was the case  with idlers who were found drinking native beers in the villages.

Witchdoctors fled, and the few who remained were hunted down like antelopes, and when caught, were canned, and their tools of trade and paraphernalia set ablaze. Bhang plants were uprooted from gardens, and growers sent to jails. Cattle rustlers also fled the location.

Education became compulsory exercise for children of all sexes, and by early 1940s, Chief Gideon Magak had earned a nickname as “Magak Odeka Popi Wuod Oyata Nyar Kabonyo”.

Chief Magak collaborated well with early missionaries of the Seventh Day Adventists {SDA} and Roman Catholic Church. This contributed greatly towards the establishment of many primary schools in the villages through out the then very expansive location in the region. This witnessed  the birth of schools like Oriang’, Wang’apala, Ober, Saye, Agoro-Sare, Nyangiela and Karabok. These schools are today some of the best government aided secondary schools in the region.

And so the story goes that the late Ex-Senior Chief Gideon Magak was the only administrator who frequented Kisii GA Secondary School. As  frequently  as possible, he would visit, while pressing the Principal of the institution with a request, to be allowed to have close door meetings with students from his location. When such a permission was granted, he would hold private talks with the young students, encouraging them to work hard and excel in their exams, so that they could go back home and work as teachers and agronomists. He would take out of his trousers pockets, and give each student a token of 3/- or occasionally 5/-. He would drive male and female students from his location to places like Siriba Agricultural College and Sigalagala College, and other training institutions, and apply for training opportunities on their behalf. He would follow up this with a frequent visit, to inspect their academic progress from time to time, as sign of encouragement.

Although reputed for having ruled his location with an iron fist, Chief Magak is also credited for having left a legacy of hard work and massive development of public institutions, such as Oyugis District sub-Hospital, Ramula Opangta Health Centre Centre, Ober Health Centre, schools and other socio-economic projects.

Ex-Senior Chief Gideon Magak, however, suffered one major political humiliation in his long rewarding administrative carer. He is being accused for having collaborated with the colonial masters, and lured one of the early nationalists, who were spearheading protracted anti-colonial war, to his arrest. This was the late Walter Fanuel Odede, who had just succeeded the late President Jomo Kenyatta, as the acting President of the defunct Kenya African Union {KAU}, and was then a member of the colonial legislative Council.

This was in 1953, almost one year after Kenyatta and six other famous Kapenguria Trial group had already been arrested an detained by the colonialists, following the declaration of the state of emergency on October 1952.

 Odede drove with a friend, the late Mzee Jalmnayo Okaka Rabala from Seme to the homestead of the Chief, located a few kilometers east of Oyugis Town. It happened at the time when the chief was still working at his office, the Chief’s Camp, situated on Atandi Hills, overlooking Oyugis Township. But instead of the chief driving straight home, to inquire at his homestead who the strange visitors were, he drove his car to the  Kisii D.C’s office, some 16 miles away, and informed the colonial government of the visit to his home by Mau Mau agents.

He returned an hour later,l followed by a lorry load of armed policemen, led by a white officer. Odede and his friends were whisked  away and taken to Kisii, where they were formally placed under arrests. The two were later released, but Odede was detained and sent to Maralal in Northern Kenya, where he remained under detention and later retractions for the next nine years.

The late Odede was later to become the father in-law of the late Tom Mboya, after his daughter, the late  Pamela Arwa Odede, was married to Mboya in 1960. This particular incident, grossly damaged the otherwise good reputation of the late Ex-Senior Chief, Gideon Magak of Kasipul, the man who is credited for being the architect of development in the region.

Densely populated, and having the highest number of registered voters in Southern Nyanza, Kasipul Kabondo, judgied by its geopolitics and vastness, is much qualified for the sub-division into two parliamentary constituencies.

The community, which considers itself as members of one family, is distributed int several major sub-clans, namely Joka-Owidi and Joka-Atinda Nar Kamine. The latter is grouping sub-clans like Joka-Kodera, Kotieno, Kakelo, Kachieng’, Kokwanyo and Konyango the largest. While the Joka-Owidi is a collection of smaller sub-clans like Kanyango and Kokal. There is also another relatively larger sub-clan Jo-Kojwach, who occupy most of eastern part of Kasipul. The Kabondo group consist of sub-clans like Joka Kakangutu, Kodhoch, Kowidi, Kasewe and Kodumo.

Kasipul-Kabondo is also housing numerous immigrant sub-clans like the Subas, Kisiis, clans fromTanzania, and Maragolis. These includes Jo-Wasweta, jo-Agoro, Jo-Kanyakwar, Jo-Karateng’, Jo-Mugusero, Jo-Bassi, Jo-Botonto, jo-Oyengwe, jo-Jimo, Jo-Basimaro, Jo-Kagak nd many other smaller sub-clans.

The recently created Kachien, is the sub-clan, which is considered to have been the earliest settlers and the indigenous occupants of the area.

The voting pattern however is not based on clanism and anyone who attracts the votes can easily be elected to parliament, provided he has a clean track record and good education. The immediate former area MP Paddy Ahenda, is an immigrant from Asembo in Rarieda district, whose family settled in the area many years ago. The man who conquered Ahenda, and hounded him out of Parliament, and the current MP, Oyugi Magwanga, belongs to Jo-Wasweta sub-clan. The Wasweta’s are members of the Luo Abasuba.

This potrays Kasipul-Kabondo as a tolerant, multi-ethnic region.

ENDS