Teso North MP Edward Oku Kaunya is a man of many mysteries as he is relatively unknown to most Kenyans outside his Busia County constituency.
The former police boss found himself in a self-imposed exile in 2010 after he claimed he was receiving death threats from unknown people.
According to the Daily Nation on Wednesday, April 2010, Kaunya allegedly left the country for Germany a few days after former President Mwai Kibaki appointed him as the assistant provincial commissioner for Nyanza, a post that he never assumed.
At the time, it was alleged that he had tried to reach senior government officials for help to no avail and thus his decision to sneak out.
His wife though claimed that her husband had travelled to Germany for treatment before he also went to the US to visit their daughter and would be back in three weeks.
This was not to be as the former Administration Police Training College deputy commander would only reappear in Kenya after Six years.
On Monday, April 25, 2016, the Daily Nation reported that he returned home after the self-imposed exile where he claimed that people had been after his life for unknown reasons and dragged in the International Criminal Court (ICC) case against 6 Kenyans.
“I was not an ICC witness. I suspect somebody was not comfortable with me around, fearing that I would take his position,” he stated.
When he fled the country, there were claims that he had overseen preparations to rig the 2007 general election at the Embakasi AP Training College and that he was an ICC witness.
He was among the first MPs to call for dialogue between President Kenyatta and ODM leader Raila Odinga in 2017 in a bid to avoid the escalation of violence.
He would open up that he actually never set foot in Germany but had hidden in South Africa for the six years where he lived in peace but could not cope with life away from his family.
Oku would further sensationally claim that his tribulations began after he differed with his boss former AP commandant and current State House Comptroller Kinuthia Mbugua over the insignia he was supposed to wear on his uniform.
During the 2017 general election, Oku vied for the Teso North Parliamentary seat and floored the incumbent Arthur Odera even after a vote recount.
