Ida Odinga's miscarriage and stillbirth distress

Ida Betty Anyango Oyoo is the daughter of the first black nurse in Kenya, Rosa Oyoo. Ms Oyoo was trained at the King African Rifles Hospital, which became King George Hospital and later renamed Kenyatta National Hospital.

Ms Oyoo, born in Khwisero, Kakamega County, was Cotu Secretary General Francis Atwoli’s aunt. Ida's father, Nehemiah Oyoo, was a medical assistant at Nyanza Hospital, Kisumu. His ancestral home was Gem. He schooled with his future in-law, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, at Maseno School, then headed by British mathematician and Anglican missionary Edward Carey Francis.

Ida met her future husband, Raila Odinga, for the first time in 1972 at the University of Nairobi (UoN). She was a second year geography student. Mr Odinga, a descendant of the famous Wanga Kingdom in Mumias, had returned from Magdeburg University in the old town of Leipzig, East Germany, in 1969, having graduated with a degree in mechanical engineering.

Also read: What you need to know to avoid miscarriage

He earned a job as a production technology lecturer at the UoN’s engineering faculty in May 1970, becoming one of its two black lecturers then.

The Flame of Freedom, authored by Raila Odinga and Sarah Elderkin, details how Ida met Odinga through his cousin, Okach Ondiek, who was married to Ida's cousin, Anna. After a flirtatious conversation, Ida and Odinga exchanged contacts and spoke occasionally on the phone. Odinga proposed and they wedded at St Francis Church, Kisumu, in 1973. The wedding was preceded by a reception at the Ofafa Memorial Hall.

Later that year, their first child, Fidel Odhiambo, was born. In their euphoria, Ida and Odinga began planning on expanding their young family. By 1976, their efforts to provide Fidel with a sibling as a playmate, only yielded sorrow and devastation. Ida suffered two miscarriages, which left her traumatised.

Third trimester

The misfortunes were compounded by Jaramogi’s health condition. He had been ailing while in detention without trial in Hola. Odinga was also under constant surveillance by the Special Branch even as he searched for funds to inaugurate the Kenya Bureau of Standards as its deputy director, and build its Lang’ata headquarters, to help standardise the gas cylinders he was manufacturing at Standard Processing Equipment Construction and Erection (Spectre) on Kampala Road, Industrial Area in Nairobi.

Ida became pregnant again and carried her unborn baby to the end of her third trimester. On the day their second son was born, she experienced excruciating labour pain. Odinga rushed her to hospital but they were informed it was a false alarm and were sent back home. He drove Ida back home.

Odinga left the house but recalled he had forgotten his Caltex House office keys. He returned to their Kileleshwa maisonette, found Ida in grave agony and rushed her back to hospital, where she was taken to the delivery room.

Also read: How soon can one get pregnant after a miscarriage?

The doctor returned with egregious news. He explained to Odinga that their son had been strangled by the umbilical cord. His heart sank as he stood in desolation. They had arranged for a celebration, but ended up expediting a heart-shattering burial at the Lang’ata Cemetery instead.

Ida conceived once more and ensured she was carefully attended to by her gynaecologist, Dr Yusuf Eraj, whom she visited weekly throughout the 1977 pregnancy. He advised her on a strict pregnancy diet and placed her under a workout regimen.

When Ida was on labour, Odinga was at home with his elder brother, Oburu Oginga, who had returned from his economics and statistics studies in Moscow, and a friend, Charles Aluo. He dropped them at Westview Hotel in Westlands, and drove Ida to Nairobi Hospital. After the delivery, Dr Yusuf walked out — this time with good news. After four years, Fidel finally had a sibling.

Ida wished to name her baby girl after her mother, Rosa, and Odinga wanted to name her after his beloved mother, Mary Juma. They agreed to adopt both names and called her Rosemary. In 1979, they had another baby, Junior.

Odinga was later held in torturous conditions in his first and second terms in detention at Kamiti, Naivasha, Manyani and Shimo La Tewa, from 1982 to 1988, before his third stint from July 1990 to June 1991.

Ida would be fired irregularly from her teaching work at The Kenya High School on September 9, 1988. On the same day, her husband was rearrested and tortured in Nyayo House basement.

She welcomed a baby girl, Winnie, on March 6, 1990, naming her after Winnie Mandela, who had witnessed her husband's release on Sunday, February 11, 1990, less than a month before Ida's final delivery.

Jeff Anthony is a novelist, a Big Brother Africa 2 Kenyan representative and founder of Jeff's Fitness Centre; @jeffbigbrother