Don was one in a diminishing breed of devoted scholars

Prof Douglas Odhiambo, who was buried on Saturday, belonged in the category of the now increasingly outnumbered lot of scholars who believe their role in society is to generate and disseminate knowledge until they breath their last. It is not a surprise that Prof was still studying as he was taken ill never to recover.

At the age of 89, Prof Odhiambo was still an extremely active man.

Not only was he the Chancellor of Technical University in Mombasa, but he was also an active farmer in Migori, an enterprise he undertook with as much dedication and commitment to detail as he had shown in his chemistry research and teaching at the University of Nairobi.

Of the leading academics of his time, the name Douglas Odhiambo could not be mentioned without thinking of the other equally renowned scholars like Professors Simeon Ominde, D.P.S. Wasawo, Bethwell Ogot, T.R. Odhiambo, Francis Ojany, Maina Mungai and Mohammed Hyder.

HUMILITY

What was unique about Prof Odhiambo, however, was  his disarming humility and sense of social and political justice.

In his death, Kenya lost an exceptionally brilliant academic who had much to brag about but chose a humble, behind-the-scenes life from where he argued for more support for, and less interference with, our public universities.

Few people knew that Prof Odhiambo was very well-known to the late T.J. Mboya and Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, both of whom very frequently consulted him on national and community issues.

During the very difficult times in Kenyan politics between 1966 and 1972, Prof Odhiambo played a very important role in mediating between the opposition and the government.

The late President of Uganda, Apollo Milton Obote, frequently consulted him on the vicissitudes of Kenyan politics. In Uganda he had his Kenyan peers, Professors Ali Mazrui, Ahmed Mohiddin and J.P.B.M. Ouma.

WISE COUNSEL

Kenyan student leaders studying in the then University of East Africa in the two campuses of Nairobi and Makerere will always remember the wise counsel that Prof Odhiambo always offered in the tumultuous university politics as he mediated between the students and the university administration.

It is perhaps as a result of these qualities, and his deep knowledge of the education system in East Africa, that he subsequently played such a big role in shaping education policy in Kenya and husbanding young universities during the Moi years and after.

When as a nation we felt that we needed a second public university, with purely local roots, it fell on Prof Odhiambo to give us one — Moi University — which he started from scratch.

It is his keen understanding of the direction Kenya needed to go in its development that he established the faculties of information sciences, agriculture, forestry and wildlife resources, applied sciences, environmental studies and other social sciences.

INTELLECTUAL GIANTS

His understanding of the expanding desire for university education made Moi University the mother of mass university education in Kenya, giving birth to institutions such as Maseno University, Masinde Muliro University and the University of Eldoret.

With the passing of Douglas, Kenya has lost one of its intellectual giants. I have lost a friend, as has the academia and science community in particular. Yet his legacy and impact as a role model will last. It is my hope that Kenya will provide an appropriate epitaph, as well as an institution in his memory, that will remind future generations of the contribution of this academic giant to the development of our nation after independence.

Mr Odinga is a former Prime Minister of Kenya. Philip Ochieng’s column resumes next week.