The then Army Commander General John Mallan Sawe called Major Daniel Opande to promote him to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel of the Kenyan Army. Due to his overwhelming belief in him , Sawe also appointed Opande as Commanding Officer of the newly formed 9th Battalion Kenya Rifles, popularly called 9KR to be based in Eldoret.....CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE>>>
As detailed in Lieutenant General Daniel Opande’s autobiography titledIn Pursuit of Peace in Africa, several factors were at play at the time. Kenya was scrambling to secure its borders after the then Ugandan strongman Idi Amin threatened Kenya’s territorial integrity by claiming a section of Kenya spanning the whole of Western, Nyanza and parts of Rift Valley including Naivasha.
Opande appealed to General Sawe for very particular reasons.
Lt. General Opande had enjoyed a streak of success with the Kenya Army helping them neutralize the shifta campaign in the Northern Frontier District of Kenya. The Shifta Movement, a 1960s secessionist rebellion in Kenya’s Northern Frontier, occurred because the ethnic Somali population sought to secede and join Somalia, driven by cultural ties and feelings of marginalisation.
He had also earned his stripes as a commanding officer with the Kenyan Parachute Company based in Napier Barracks, Gilgil. As such, he was familiar with operational requirements of defending Kenya’s territory.
While setting up the 9th Battalion Kenya Rifles, the Kenya Armed Forces settled on Eldoret as the home for the new unit, to contain the threat posed by Amin who Kenya viewed as a threat to its interests.
Eldoret was not far from the Kenya-Uganda border. The current metropolis was strategically located to give Kenyan forces an advantage in the event Kenya was ever invaded. To this end, the government had bought 13,000 acres of land to serve this purpose.
3 months before Opande was appointed Lieutenant General, the top military leadership had sent an advance team to the very same location that the Eldoret camp would later be set up. However as General Sawe would later narrate to Opande, the military bosses were unhappy with the work done by the advance party.
In his view, the advance party had achieved minimal results. While giving him the mission brief when he called him, General Sawe asked Opande to report to his office the next morning after which he would proceed to Eldoret to fix the mess and get the job done.
Upon getting to Eldoret. Opande noticed several problems. The sprawling 13,000 acre complex lacked survey maps.
Conversely, some 180 giraffes were present at the scene and would sometimes pull down their tents which served as makeshift shelters in the middle of the night . This would leave them without a roof over their heads.
Additionally, the selected site for the camp was too close to the main Eldoret-Kitale road and was too exposed in his professional judgement.
It was Major John Waittiki, the deputy to Lt.General Opande who would then make the trip to the Ministry of Lands to get survey maps which would later come in handy in the planning for the construction of barracks, ablution blocks, officer messes, offices, and other amenities such as kitchens.
9KR had to build their base from the ground unlike previous units such as 7th Kenya Rifles (7KR) which inherited the fortress that is Gilgil Barracks from the outgoing British Army that built the base and its facilities.
It took 6 months for the surveyors to mark and permanently erect the beacons around the Eldoret land. The Ministry of Works took the lead in construction at the site.
After settling down in the new site, the 9KR officers went about the job of tree planting after receiving seedlings from the Kenya Forest Service. Every soldier had a duty to plant two trees a day. As fate would have it, even the late Prof. Wangari Maathai visited the camp and exchanged ideas with Opande on making Moi Barracks a greenbelt zone.
The creation of 9KR and Eldoret Barracks became a career turning point for Lt.General Opande who ironically had already handed in his retirement letter to his superiors before General Sawe called him. Sawe promised to take up the matter with his superiors and told Opande to remain calm in the mean time.
Lt. General Opande handed in his retirement letter because he felt his career had stagnated and that civilian life would afford him more opportunities.
Coincidentally two days later after this promise was made, the then Chief of General Staff (CGS) General Jackson Mulinge arrived in Eldoret to inspect works at the site.
General Mulinge proceeded to Opande’s office where they had a cup of tea followed by a candid conversation about his retirement letter. Mulinge then ordered Opande to withdraw his retirement letter forthwith.
Opande was ordered to focus on serving the Army and his nation with the same dedication he had shown since he joined the disciplined forces. In effect, he had turned down the retirement request. Not one to disappoint his superiors, Opande did exactly as he was instructed.
Lt.General Opande commanded 9KR for two years honing them into a premier unit and one of the best infantry battalions of the Second Brigade of Kenya Armed Forces (now Kenya Defence Forces).
Years before, Kenya’s founding President Jomo Kenyatta had stopped Idi Amin’s plans to invade Kenya. Setting up the camp at Eldoret also turned out to be a masterstroke by the Daniel Moi regime as the Ugandan strongman never actualised his plans.
Today, Eldoret Moi Barracks serves as the Recruit Training School for new soldiers, and the annual KDF pass-out parade is done there…CONTINUE READING>>
