Your choices will have consequences, Ken Okoth’s paternal family tells the Late MP’s mum

The paternal relatives of Ken Okoth now say they won’t attend the Late MP’s funeral ceremony at Kabondo Kasipul in Homa Bay County on Saturday, August 3.

Okoth’s body will be flown from Nairobi to Ogenga Village in Kasipul Kabondo -- his mother’s ancestral home -- on Saturday morning. A funeral mass scheduled to begin at 10 am will follow, thereafter, at Got Rateng’ Secondary School.

ODM leader Raila Odinga says Ken Okoth’s body will, thereafter, be handed over to his family “to do the rest the same way Kenneth Matiba’s remains were given to his family to execute his will, [which demanded he be cremated after he passes on].”

It remains unclear whether Okoth’s body will be cremated or buried, as details of his alleged will directing he be calcined upon death are yet to be made public.

“We won’t attend Ken Okoth’s funeral ceremony. The MP’s mum, Angeline Ajwang Ongere, should be ready to face the consequences of violating the Luo traditions,” Chrispine Aseto Obonyo, who is the brother of Ken Okoth’s father, told K24 Digital on Wednesday at his home in Kanyachir Amocho Village in Kochia, Homa Bay County.

Aseto says, according to the Luo customs, a son must be buried on his father’s ancestral land.

If that doesn’t happen, consequences of unknown impact would befall the person or people who prevented a son from being interred on his father’s land, said Aseto.

Aseto’ remarks come on the back of a brewing stalemate on whether Okoth should be buried or cremated.

The Late lawmaker’s mother, Ms Ongere, has adamantly stated she is opposed to the idea of her son being cremated.

“I am of the opinion that he be buried at Kabondo Kasipul in Homa Bay County, where I wake up and see his grave every day,” said Ms Ongere.

The source of claims that Ken Okoth would be cremated remains unknown.

Unconfirmed reports, however, say the Late parliamentarian had left behind a will with his wife, directing he should be cremated upon death.

According to a post spread widely on instant messaging app, WhatsApp, the Late MP “is scheduled to be cremated in a private function in Nairobi after requiem services at Starehe Boys’ Centre & School and Kabondo Kasipul in Homa Bay”.

Okoth’s parents, Nicholas Obonyo and Angeline Ajwang, separated in the 1980s, when Okoth was barely a teenager.

Okoth then moved in with his mother to her ancestral home in Ogenga Village in Kabondo Kasipul Constituency.

The mother and son would later move to Kibra, where Okoth was raised.

Ms Ongere said she worked for the now-defunct Nairobi City Council for 26 years.

Okoth’s father was buried in Kochia in 1993 on a piece of land where his grandfather is also interred.