Daniel arap Moi

Daniel Toroitich arap Moi CGH (/ˈmoʊiː/ MOH-ee; 2 September 1924 – 4 February 2020) was a Kenyan politician who served as the second president of Kenya from 1978 to 2002. He is the country's longest-serving president to date. Moi previously served as the third vice president of Kenya from 1967 to 1978 under President Jomo Kenyatta, becoming the president following the latter's death.

Born into the Tugen sub-group of the Kalenjin people in the Kenyan Rift Valley, Moi studied as a boy at the Africa Inland Mission school before training as a teacher at the Tambach teachers training college, working in that profession until 1955. He then entered politics and was elected a member of the Legislative Council for Rift Valley. As independence approached, Moi joined the Kenyan delegation which travelled to London for the Lancaster House Conferences, where the country's first post-independence constitution was drafted. In 1960, he founded the Kenya African Democratic Union (KADU) as a rival party to Kenyatta's Kenya African National Union (KANU). Following independence in 1963, Kenyatta who became Prime Minister and later President of the new nation, convinced Moi to merge the two parties. Kenyatta appointed Moi to his government in 1964 and then promoted him to vice-president in 1967. Despite opposition from a Kikuyu elite known as the Kiambu Mafia, Kenyatta retained Moi as his Vice President. Moi took over as president when Kenyatta died in 1978.

Initially popular both nationally and in Western countries, who saw his regime as countering against influences from the Eastern Bloc-aligned governments of Ethiopia and Tanzania, Moi's popularity fell around 1990 as the economy stagnated after the end of the Cold War. Following the agitation and external pressure, he was forced to allow multiparty elections in 1991. He then led his party, KANU, to victory in the 1992 and 1997 elections, both of which have generally been regarded as neither free nor fair by independent observers. Constitutionally barred from seeking a third term, Moi chose Uhuru Kenyatta as his successor, but Kenyatta was defeated by opposition leader Mwai Kibaki in the 2002 general election, and Kibaki succeeded Moi as president. Kenyatta would eventually win the presidency in the 2013 election.

Moi's regime was deemed dictatorial especially before 1992 when Kenya was a one-party state. Human rights organisations such as Amnesty International, as well as a special investigation by the United Nations, accused Moi of human rights abuses during his presidency. Inquiries held after the end of his presidency found evidence that Moi and his sons had engaged in significant levels of corruption, including the 1990s Goldenberg scandal.

Moi was born Toroitich arap (son of) Moi, Toroitich meaning "welcome home the cattle", in the Rift Valley village of Kuriengwo, which is now in Sacho division of Baringo County. Moi's father, Kimoi arap Chebii, died in 1928. Moi was only four then and little is known about his mother, Kabon. What is known is that Tuitoek, his elder brother, became his guardian. Moi was one of the herdsboys from Sacho location recommended to join the new Africa Inland Mission (AIM) School at Kabartonjo in 1934 before it was shifted to Kapsabet. He was from the Tugen sub-group of the Kalenjin people.

At the African Mission School at Kabartonjo, Moi became a Christian and adopted the name Daniel. Moi attended Tambach Teachers Training College after its relocation from Kabartonjo from 1945 to 1947. This is after the colonial government denied him a chance to enroll at Alliance High School. He later attended Kagumo Teacher's College, and taught classes at Tambach Teacher's Training College. Later he became the headmaster of a school in the Keiyo District. He worked as a teacher from 1946 until 1955.

Moi entered politics in 1955 when he was elected Member of the Legislative Council for Rift Valley. He was the chosen replacement of Dr. John ole Tameno, the former representative who had had to quit due to heavy drinking and suspected connections to the freedom movement. In 1957 Moi was re-elected Member of the Legislative Council for Rift Valley. Moi was part of the Kenyan delegation at the Lancaster House Conferences in London, which drafted the country's first post-independence constitution, and in 1961, he became Minister of Education in the pre-independence government.

In 1960 he founded the Kenya African Democratic Union (KADU) with Ronald Ngala as a political alternative to the Kenya African National Union (KANU) led by Jomo Kenyatta. KADU pressed for a federalist constitution, while KANU was in favour of a centralized government. The advantage lay with the numerically stronger KANU, and the first post-independence constitution emphasised national unity, structuring the country as a unitary state.