Power, privilege and influence: Words that define the life of Simeon Nyachae

President Moi and Finance Minister Simeon Nyachae in deep conversation

Simeon Nyachae’s chequered life can be captured in three words -- power, privilege and influence. It was the power and influence of money on the one hand and the politics and privilege that goes with the two on the other.

Sometimes the power threatened to slip through his fingers, consigning him into the secluded spaces of sorrow and solitude. Yet he only sojourned there temporarily before bouncing back into familiar territory. With varying degrees of success that has seen some of his progeny play significant roles on the national stage, his narrative and that of his family remains the story of a household that understands the meaning of power. It all began with the grand progenitor of the family, the late Senior Chief Musa Nyandusi.

Young people in the lower-lying parts of the Gusii Highlands in the 1960s and in the 70s had an apocryphal narrative about the Nyandusi family. They would point out at faraway shiny reflections, high up in Nyaribari. They said they came from Mzee Nyandusi’s homestead. Long after the redoubtable Chief Nyandusi had passed on in 1970, youth still joked about the “reflection of the sheen of his legendary money, placed out to dry in the sun”.

Chief Nyandusi was reputed to have been massively wealthy. So wealthy is he supposed to have been that his money would get damp in the house, in the giant trunks in which it was kept. It was, therefore, necessary that it should be spread out in the sunshine every so often to get rid of the moisture. Moreover, the mythical narratives went on, some of the trunks and their precious contents would accompany the great chief to various places he went, carried at the back of a Landrover vehicle.

Dish out money

Some say the contents were intended as handouts. For the great chief was said to have been an overly generous individual. Once they got to their destination, his wife Paulina Bosibori would sit on the trunk instead of the proffered chair, waiting for the time to dish out money.

It was to the legendary Nyandusi and his wife Paulina that Simeon Nyachae was born on February 6, 1932, in Nyanchwa, Kisii. He was given the name Nyachae as derivative from the tea farming that the family was involved with, according to his own narrative in his biography. Simeon was born into power, privilege and influence in the wake of British colonial rule in Kenya.

Simeon Nyachae (centre) introduces his wives Esther (left), Martha (second left)and Grace in this 1993 photo as former minister Andrew Omanga looks on.[File, Standard]

The country was recruited into the expansive British empire with the declaration of the colony in 1923. Three years later, in 1926, Nyandusi was appointed assistant chief. This was a hugely powerful position in the then only three-year-old colonial order. Nyandusi got the appointment on account of his basic education received at SDA Nyanchwa Sector School.

Born in 1896 to Ayako Momera, Nyandusi was one of the very first Africans to learn how to read and write. He could also speak English. Ahead of his appointment as a chief, he worked as a clerk for an Asian entrepreneur in Gusii. He also had a short stint as a teacher. Then came the chieftaincy that transformed his life and laid the foundation for future generations.

As fate would have it, Chief Geturengia of Nyaribari Location – and under whom Nyandusi served – died a few months after Nyandusi’s appointment as an assistant chief. Nyachae’s father suddenly found himself in the deep end of the pool of colonial administration, when he was catapulted into the position of chief, to replace the departed Geturengia.

As he was still considered a greenhorn, however, Nyandusi was made to work under Chief Onsongo of Bogetutu. His three-year understudy of Onsongo was tiresome, given the then strong rivalry among the Gusii clans. However, he survived. He would go on to become easily the most influential individual in the Gusii countryside, all the way into the early independence era. Nyachae would recall of his father, “a decisive, goal-oriented and sometimes authoritarian (character).” He states in his autobiography, titled Simeon Nyachae: Walking through the Corridors of Service that in his time, his father was easily the most authoritative and influential individual in the Gusii community.

It was into this influence and authority that young Nyachae was born. In the fullness of time, he would himself become a man of authority and influence. Although he would go on to serve in various portfolios in the Cabinet under Presidents Moi and Kibaki, the crescendo of Nyachae’s authority was in the 1984–87 period, when he served as the Chief Secretary, a position domiciled in the Office of the President at Harambee House.

President Moi accompanied by Principal Secretary in the office of the President Simeone Nyachae congratulates new Attorney-General Joseph Kamau Kamere after being sworn in. [File, Standard]

Both his personal drive and the mandate of the office sent fear down many frightened spines. He would later reflect about his tour of duty and the power in this portfolio in the words, “The position gave the office holder the powers to co-ordinate and direct operations in the civil service. The Chief Secretary was also to oversee the implementation of government policies in accordance with the Constitution.”

Remarkably and expectedly, this did not go down well with everybody. Nyachae would write in his autobiography, “Some politicians never liked the powers vested with this position and were sarcastically calling it the position of the ‘Prime Minister’.”

Martin Shikuku, then MP for Butere, was among the first politicians to have a frontal go at Nyachae. In a harsh public harangue against the Chief Secretary, Shikuku derogatorily recalled Nyachae’s father’s career in colonial times. He unflatteringly tied it up with the gloss and glory of the man’s own assignments in the Kenyatta and Moi governments.

Shikuku was irked by the powers that Nyachae had so far exercised and rebuked him for what he called “behaving like a prime minister”. He reminded Nyachae that such a position did not exist in Kenya. Nyachae took it coolly. A seasoned career civil servant, who had risen through the ranks over the decades, he had by now perfected the art of keeping into his own lane on the treacherous track that often brought together public servants and politicians in competing and conflictual spaces. In future, he would have his own go at politics. Meanwhile, he was busy coordinating ministerial activities under the famous District Focus for Rural Development programme (DFRD), whose public face he was.

Decades before this, Nyandusi had understood fully the meaning of government, courtesy of his early compact with the colonial government. He was clear in his mind that his eldest son must work for the government. Holding the awesome position of chief in the heady colonial years enabled Nyandusi to rub shoulders with fellow power barons of the day. As a colonial chief, he was not only the topmost administrator in the location, but also the magistrate and the topmost prisons officer.

His son recalled, “He arrested offenders, prosecuted them and punished them.” He interacted very closely with other notables, such as Mr A A Lawrence, the District Commissioner for South Nyanza, Chief Agwata of Mugirango and Senior Chief Arap Tengecha of the Kipsigis. The family ties between the Nyandusi and Tengecha families outlived the two elders.

The position also opened up other opportunities. Chief Nyandusi was able to grow coffee and extended the practice to his subjects in Kisii at a time when the colonial regime did not allow Africans to grow the crop. He chaired the Kisii Coffee Growers Association. He was also the foremost flour miller in the region.

Nyandusi also pioneered the construction of schools, and was the force behind the building of what is today Kisii National School as well as Kereri Girls High School, besides many other smaller schools in Kisii. He built market places all over the Gusii Highlands and drew his people into the spirit of entrepreneurship. In return for all this, Nyandusi enjoyed power and influence that went all the way to Central and Western Kenya. He encountered Kenya’s future President Jomo Kenyatta in those years and housed him for some time, in the season of the Mau Mau. The gesture of goodwill would later be repaid when President Kenyatta appointed Nyachae Provincial Commissioner in 1966.

These chiefs lived well, with Nyandusi owning his first car – a Fordson – in 1943. He later traded it in for a Chevrolet Sedan. Nyachae remarked later, “Only colonialists and wealthy businessmen could afford an automobile. My father’s Chevrolet Sedan was a subject of local conversation and an attraction for many crowds wherever he went.”

Thus it was that after his studies in Kisii School and training in Administration in the United Kingdom, Nyachae raised eyebrows when he took up a job with the East African Breweries. He had done a short stint as a clerk in the DC’s office in Kisii immediately after high school, and his father had hoped that he would like the environment and be cultured to work in State administration. That was the whole idea behind Nyandusi organising for his son to be trained in the UK.

Upon his return from the UK, he was appointed as an African Assistant Administrative Officer in the colonial government and posted to Ukwala in Central Nyanza. He did not like the posting though, largely on account of the disdainful attitude of the white District Officer to whom he reported. He resigned from the position and joined the East African Breweries as a Labour Relations Officer. He liked his new job very much and threw himself into it with verve.

Nyandusi was, however, quite disturbed by this move. He assembled a number of senior chiefs to accompany him to Nairobi to speak to his son. The message was simple and clear. They wanted him back in public service. He was literally bullied into giving up his job with the breweries. He was posted to Kangundo and Machakos, where he rose quickly to the position of the district officer. He was soon moved to Makueni to serve as a district officer and a First-Class Magistrate. The rise and rise of a colossus had just begun.

Elsewhere, the activities leading to independence in 1963 were also going on. By 1962 it was clear that the country would soon gain uhuru. Nyachae was selected alongside five other African public officers to train in the UK in readiness for leading roles in the management of the transition to independence. Other notable personalities in subsequent years were Melton ole Ncharo and Joab Omino. They were given their letters of appointment to their new roles upon arrival at the Embakasi Airport in Nairobi. Nyachae was posted to Nyandarua as district commissioner.

The ascent was fast and decisive. When President Kenyatta made him Provincial Commissioner in charge of Rift Valley Province, Nyachae was only 34 years old. He recalled Senior Chief Titi remarking that Kenyatta had appointed a boy as PC. He was cast once again to the deep end of things, this time in the mud of politics of land, resettlement and negative ethnicity. It took a lot of organisational and patient negotiation skills to wade through the complications of resettling Africans on large scale farms that had previously belonged to white settlers.

By the time Mzee Kenyatta passed on in 1978, Nyachae was a thorough broom in the management of public affairs. The new president, Daniel arap Moi, moved him to the Office of the President, to serve as one of the Permanent Secretaries. He worked diligently under the overall Head of the Civil Service and Secretary to the Cabinet, Jeremiah Kiereini. Six years into the Nyayo era, he replaced the retiring Kiereini as the boss in Public Service. The position was changed to Chief Secretary, with the sweeping powers that politicians dreaded.

During his tenure in Harambee House, Nyachae was both respected and feared. He was a workaholic who did not know such a thing as a break. Nor did he know how to work without clearly defined goals and processes. He was not the kind of person joyriders and hunters of fortune in government would be comfortable with. It was at this time that he spearheaded the DFRD programme.

Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta and former Cabinet Minister Simeon Nyachae during a wedding at the Nairobi Central SDA Church. [File, Standard]

He drove the policy and the public service with zeal. That he was very close to President Moi was never in doubt. Their closeness saw them get into a business partnership, apart from working together in government. Yet, soon after his retirement from the public service, the two fell out badly.

Nyachae had thought that he would now go into mainstream politics, but some people from his Kisii backyard had other ideas. They wanted him out of the way. This was despite the perception that he had brought far too many Kisii professionals into prominent positions in government and business. While their competitors from other tribes were happy that he had retired, his own compatriots from Kisii thought that this was not good enough. They wanted him to fade into oblivion altogether. This was easily a factor of Kisii fatigue with the Musa Nyandusi dominance of public space in the community, spanning the period 1926–1987. They, too, wanted their day in the sunshine.

As soon as he stepped out of power, the political class in the district assembled at Keberigo to make hostile pronouncements against him. They wormed their way to the centre of power in the Kanu government, pledging their unswerving loyalty to President Moi, but also making it clear that they did not want Nyachae anywhere in a position of power and influence. A horrible night of long knives had arrived for Nyachae. He would go on to eat the lonely bread of sorrow and drink the bitter waters of affliction for the next five years when nobody wanted to go anywhere near him, barring a few truly loyal old friends, like ole Ncharo. His businesses were denied licenses. Ruin stared him in the eye.

The saving grace was that under both his father’s tenure in public service and his own, the family had built a powerful financial empire that could withstand tidal shocks and waves. Besides, joint ownership of some of these businesses with persons who remained powerful in the Nyayo government made it impossible for them to wash him out completely.

Powerful hidden hands

He is remarkably remembered for the full-page paid-up notices that he resorted to placing in the newspapers as the avenue to ventilate his grief to the public. The papers would not feature him in the earned news spaces. Nyachae was a veritable outcast.

He would only bounce back after the restoration of multiparty democracy in 1991. The great irony was that Nyachae had been one of the powerful hidden hands in the removal of multiparty politics a decade earlier. The Mwakenya incarcerations took place under his watch as the head of public service. The monster he had helped to create in his sunny days had returned to eat him up.

Multiparty competition, however, saved him from the cold. A powerful Opposition wave in 1991 sent President Moi to look for Nyachae and to seek reconciliation. Both men understood that they had common economic interests that would be best served and protected if they worked together. To the huge disappointment of the Opposition chiefs, Nyachae cast his lot with Moi and Kanu in the 1992 elections. He returned a respectable number of parliamentary seats, including his own in Nyaribari Chache. He also helped Moi to poll well in Kisii in the presidential vote.

He went on to serve as Minister for Agriculture, and later for Finance, in the turbulent years that followed – with icy relations with the donor community. In 1999 he resigned from his Cabinet position following another fallout with Moi, who had demoted him to be Environment minister. His detractors in Kisii were also still trying to bring him down, this time led by Goeffrey Asanyo, a new political kid on the block who emerged from nowhere.

Nyachae offered himself for the presidency in the transitional 2002 elections on a Ford People ticket but came third, behind President Kibaki of Narc and Uhuru Kenyatta of Kanu. He, however, retained his Nyaribari Chache seat in Parliament. In 2005, following a bitter falling out in Narc, President Kibaki named him into his Cabinet. He was part of the Kibaki Banana Team that lost the 2005 constitutional referendum, with Kisii voting solidly against the proposed constitution.

In 2007, he led President Kibaki’s Party of National Unity’s campaign effort in Kisii and did dismally. The new Orange Democratic Movement virtually cleaned the boards. The Nyandusi/Nyachae influence in Kisii was clearly on the wane. Thereafter, Nyachae has led a quiet life, focusing on his family and its business interests.

The one thing that is not in doubt is that the fall of the giant brings the curtain down on a combined season of 95 years of the Musa Nyandusi influence in Kisii and elsewhere in Kenya. Will the Nyandusi flag fly again? Only time can tell.

— The writer is a strategic public communications adviser.

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