The End of Radicalism: “Throwing Oginga Odinga Under the Bus”

Abstract

This chapter describes and analyzes the political and strategic initiatives of the British intelligence services and the CIA, to oust the radicals from the government and the KANU (the sole political party). A lot of attention is placed on efforts to oust Oginga Odinga from power. He had come to be identified by the British intelligence services and the CIA as an unacceptable symbol of radical nationalism and christened by these intelligence services as an intolerable communist. In the end, Kenyatta and the conservative nationalists threw Oginga “under the bus.” The power of political propaganda, employment of fear, political assassinations, and the propping up of Kenyatta and his conservative neo-colonial policies and the continental implications are discussed.