- Ogeta described how their usual routine morning walk on October 15, 2025, at a facility in Kerala, India, where Raila had been receiving care, suddenly turned into a medical emergency.
Maurice Ogeta, Raila Odinga’s former bodyguard, has recounted the late opposition leader’s final moments before his death.
Speaking to NTV, Ogeta described how their usual routine morning walk on October 15, 2025, at an Ayurvedic wellness facility in Kerala, India, where Raila had been receiving care, suddenly turned into a medical emergency.
The two had set out for their normal morning exercise, walking along a 50-metre circuit around the villa grounds.
At that time, Raila was in high spirits as they were chatting. According to Ogeta, they covered the first lap with ease.
“He was so much in good moods,” Ogeta said.
However, during the second round, Raila suddenly stopped walking. Ogeta, who was walking behind him, heard a faint sound from the former premier, which sounded like something had struck him.
Concerned by the sudden halt, Ogeta asked Raila what was wrong and whether he was experiencing pain in his back or leg. However, Raila did not respond.
I asked the question again, and I said, 'let's go there I check on you'. He just did this (turns his head to the right) and gave me his hand," he said.
Ogeta said he immediately tried to support him by holding his hand, but he could not walk and instead leaned against him.
When he attempted to lower Raila to the ground and assist him, he realised that Raila had lost control of his body and was unable to respond.
“By the time I was trying to hold his hand so that we could walk, I realized he had lost control of his body,” Ogeta said.
"I took a different stance to support him while he was standing and it is how it went and I took him to the ground slowly, struggled to put him in a recovery position and started calling for help," he added.
His call prompted health personnel at the facility to arrange an ambulance to take Raila to Devamatha Hospital, where he received emergency care. He shortly took his last breath at the Indian facility.
Kenya's political heavyweight, Odinga, breathed his last on October 15, 2025, aged 80.
Ogeta's journey with Mr Odinga began around 1997, when he worked as a gym instructor and manager at the Nairobi Safari Club.
He said that Mr Odinga, then a workout-a-holic, visited the facility for his routine exercise when a group of men in black suits arrived at the facility, demanding to see him.
"Raila was a fitness freak, he used to love working out. This specific evening he came, and I received some 6 guests at the health club," he told Citizen TV in a past interview.
The men, looking suspicious, asked for Odinga's whereabouts, and the receptionist called him while the former legislator was in the steam room.
"I went to the steam room and I asked him if he was expecting anyone. His reaction said it all. I went back and the number had increased to about 10," he said.
Now alert to the potential threat, he cooked up a lie to distract the team and sneaked out Mr Odinga through an emergency exit.
"I told them room 1607 which did not exist in the Safari Club. By the time the lift got to the 16th floor, I took Raila, with the help of the receptionist, gave him my tracksuit and my hat and used the emergency exit to sneak him out of the hotel, put him in a taxi headed to Parliament."
His family now plans to lead a first death anniversary as the main public commemoration is scheduled for Migwena Cultural Sports Ground in Bondo and is open to mourners.
The former premier was buried at Kang’o ka Jaramogi in Bondo, where the mausoleum dedicated to him and his father, Kenya’s first Vice President Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, now stands.
President William Ruto on October 7 unveiled and dedicated Raila’s mausoleum at Kang’o ka Jaramogi, in a ceremony attended by members of the Odinga family, government officials and other dignitaries.