Back in 1988, Kenya was in a state of subjugation with the then President Daniel arap Moi coming down hard on any dissent following the failed coup of 1982.
This was the key reason why ODM leader Raila Odinga had to take up a covert identity, after his release from detention.
Once free, he came back to a country that was rife with fear, yet full of disgruntled military servicemen and women, who were rendered jobless after the 1982 incident.
"During the preceding few months since my release from detention, I had met a number of former Kenya Air Force servicemen, several of whom had come to me seeking employment," the former PM divulged in his book, The Flame of Freedom.
Raila teamed up with renowned activist, Koigi wa Wamwere, and set up an off-the-books operation, to send the destitute men for training abroad, via Dar es Salaam, where Koigi was living in exile.
However, as Raila was under 24-hour surveillance by officers from the defunct Special Branch, he needed to come up with a way to lose the hawk-eyed team, in order to coordinate the entire operation.
Odinga had to create a new identity for himself - that of a Kanzu-wearing cleric, complete with a hat as well as a code name, TR.
"We needed a secure line in order to speak, so I had decided to use a telephone booth at the General Post Office on Kenyatta Avenue in Nairobi. I then took the precaution of disguising myself in a kanzu and a fez (felt headdress) and arranged to be dropped near the post office," he divulged.
Their undercover operation went on without a glitch for a while, but trouble would soon come to their doorstep, after Koigi's emissary was arrested and allegedly tortured for information.
"He had spilt the beans and the others were all arrested. He had also mentioned my name and now the authorities had come for me," Raila disclosed in his autobiography.
The current opposition leader was then taken to the infamous Nyayo House torture chambers, where he underwent an ordeal that has scarred him to date.
