PLO Lumumba's Plan to Steal Back Africa

Africa's Public Intellectual No.1

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PLO Lumumba is probably Africa’s most well-known public intellectual. He is everywhere, delivering sermons in churches, having private meetings with African leaders, even attending political rallies.

This is the story of his rise to fame. How he was rejected by his own, and how he took over the online Afrosphere. Its also the story of his plan. A plan to steal back Africa. But perhaps not from who you think.

Early Years

Patrick Loch Otieno Lumumba was born in Usenge, a small town on the shores of Lake Victoria in 1962. He was named after Congo’s tragic first president, Patrice Lumumba, who had been killed in a Western-backed coup a year earlier.

Lumumba’s family moved to Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, and he quickly showed promise in school. Lumumba rapidly moved through the academic world, gaining an undergraduate and master’s in law in Nairobi and Dar es Salam, before completing a Doctorate in Belgium.

Back in Kenya Lumumba continued down a legal-academic path, but his ambitions went far beyond the university. He helped create several civil society groups and a charitable foundation. In 2004 he made his first serious entry into the political arena, helping to draft a new constitution for Kenya. The 2005 national referendum saw President Kibaki campaign in favour of the constitution. Sadly for Lumumba, 58% of Kenyan’s voted against the changes.

In 2007 Lumumba experienced politics at the grass roots as he tried and failed to win a seat as a member of parliament.

The Fall and Rise

But in 2010 it looked like his big political break had finally come. He was appointed as director of the Kenyan Anti-Corruption Commission. Lumumba made many appearances on Kenyan TV:

“You cannot run a country whose creed is greed. And the duty of those of us who have been given the honour and privilege to be the arrow’s head in the fight against corruption is to change that creed.”

Lumumba immediately ruffled feathers. Senior government ministers started stepping down as the Commission opened cases against them. Lumumba’s Commission took on so many cases, so quickly, that there was soon a sizeable body of MPs who harboured grievances against him. Others worried they might be the next target of Lumumba’s suspicions.

The political backlash was so severe that a new bill was passed, replacing the Commission with a new body with less power. Lumumba and his staff were dismissed a year after being appointed. The anti-corruption arrow was snapped in two.

‘They wanted me to appear to be fighting corruption, not to actually fight it!’

After taking a much-needed break, Lumumba returned to the legal-academic world, taking the role of director at the Kenyan School of Law. But it was as a visiting speaker that he began to make waves across Africa.

Invited to speak at the Third African Anti-Corruption Convention in Uganda in 2013, Lumumba spoke freely, directly, and harshly about corruption in Africa pouring out the frustrations of his time in politics.

“We live in a country where our young ladies who have recently attained the age of puberty cannot afford sanitary pads, but our men and women in public offices have iPads, which they do not know how to use.”

After years spent teaching university students, Lumumba’s passion for Africa’s next generation became a running theme in his speeches. The corrupt politicians who used leverage and petty crime to get what they wanted were responsible for driving disenfranchised African youth into the ocean on dangerous journeys to Europe and America.

“I am already living in Africa fifty years from now. At this time, the narration about Africa has changed… They will see an Africa where young men and women from Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Mali and Mauritania no longer drown in the Mediterranean Sea seeking to travel to Europe into latter day slavery.”

Stolen Moments

As Lumumba became a household name at conventions across the continent, people began to suggest he write his speeches down and distil them into a book. In 2016 Stolen Moments was published, but it wasn’t quite what people were expecting. Instead of a list of problems and solutions, Lumumba had written a story. Most Lumumba fans haven’t read Stolen Moments as it is only available in Kenya. But the novel explorers some of his most important ideas.

Stolen Moments begins with Agwati: An intelligent man, with legal training, not unlike the author. Agwati writes a PhD called ‘Stolen Moments’ in which he identified points in his country’s history where corrupt individuals ‘stole’ something. Independence should have been a moment of national unity, but it was stolen by politicians who used foreign funding and ethnic tensions to divide the nation. The thesis is so controversial it is banned and Agwati is forced to flee to Europe. But Europe proves a false hope as he struggles to find clients who trust a black African lawyer.

Parallel to Agwati is the character of Sabina who endures terrible injustice and suffering. Married to an older man at a young age, she becomes a widowed mother whilst at university. On graduating she struggles to find work because of ethnic prejudice and bosses who demand favours. She too leaves home for a foreign land, going to work for a wealthy family in Saudi Arabia. After experiencing unspeakable abuse, she eventually choses to end it all.

Agwati’s story continues as his country creates a new constitution which promises a multi-party democracy. He returns home to campaign as a politician but discovers that this moment too is being stolen away. The president has created a youth movement which is bribing and threatening people into voting for him. The once united opposition is divided by ethnic tensions. When Agwati tries to convince villagers to vote for him, they demand financial handouts.

But the novel ends on a hopeful note. That little by little, the younger generation are realising what has been taken from them and are mobilizing to take it back.

The connections to Lumumba’s own life are clear. His failed constitutional reform, his aborted career as an MP, his own rejection. Present also are key themes like the fate of Africa’s youth, the illusion of a better life abroad, and the way corruption and negative ethnicity destroys a country’s future.

Lumumba’s characters Agwati and Sabina should be working in positions of leadership in their country. They are well educated and naturally capable.

“Education is the equalizer because it is still true that the mind is the standard of a human being. No matter how tall you are, if your mind does not work well you are just a tall fool!”

But they live in a system which appeals to the lowest common denominator: to prejudice and short-term greed. So even with the arrival of multi-party democracy, problems persist in a toxic culture of corruption.

“Democracy presupposes an educated electorate.”

The Big Picture

And so, the task assigned to moral, educated people is not to enjoy the promised land, but to fight to clean it. Lumumba loves the metaphor of hygiene. Nairobi’s largest slum, Kibera, is ‘an NGO factory’ and the failure of charities to solve sanitation problems shows how aid can disempower. Its important to recognise things which disempower Africa and lack of hygiene, whether physical or moral, is always a sign of disempowerment.

“The intervention we see from Western donors will never, ever help Africa. They may appear to do so, but they are purely anodynal: they make you not feel the pain. But ultimately they will ensure you are unable to do the simple things you can do…”

Equally ambiguous is the role of religion in Africa. Lumumba is a commited Christian but he hasn’t been afraid to call out Christianity which disempowers Africans. Despite these criticisms, Lumumba will accept an offer to preach a sermon at churches of all denominations. Because Lumumba is not just a social crusader. He’s politician who takes allies where he can find them, in his goal to spread a message of African unity and empowerment.

"Africa can rise and Africa will rise, but it is not going to rise by prayer and fasting!”

Lumumba’s first close friendship with an African statesman was in Tanzania. For several years he had been saying very positive things about President Magufuli in his speeches. In 2020 he was invited to the state house to meet and talk with the president in person. As Lumumba’s speeches have gone viral on the internet, he has become an attractive friend for African leaders.

In these meetings PLO Lumumba uses his influence to promote a Pan-African vision, calling on leaders to consider allowing free movement between borders and creating shared currencies. Since Magufuli’s death, Lumumba has courted President Museveni in Uganda. For Lumumba, Museveni was a vital ally in his campaign to encourage the creation of an East African Federation, uniting Uganda, Tanzania, and Kenya. However, following the 2024 finance bill protests in Kenya, Lumumba distanced himself from Museveni.

Stolen back!

In April 2024, Kenyan MPs were vetting the nations new diplomats. Candidates were recommended by the President and then interviewed by a committee. Several candidates seemed like underqualified ‘yes men’, but it was Charles Keiru who made headlines.

Nominated to represent Kenya in Goma, DRC, now at the heart of a regional crisis, Keiru only listed the role Petrol Station Attendant on his CV. On his desk he had a list of papers with what he should say. But rather than asking him about the role, the committee asked he define GDP and balance of trade.

GDP, gross domestic product, Keiru defined as the population of a country. He failed to define balance of trade.

Kenyan MP Elijah Memusi was frustrated asking the candidate: ‘How do you think qualified diplomats with PhDs feel when they see your nomination? Don’t you think you should leave the position to others?’. Keiru, the politically appointed stooge, had wasted everyone’s time. But he had also stolen a nomination from someone with the required experience and education.

In the same month Lumumba was in Rwanda, where he was delivering a speech on the anniversary of 1994. He might once have hoped for a nomination like Keiru’s. Now he has created his own movement, a Pan-African quest for good governance. The vision is continental but there is room for everyone.

“I hold the view that it is block by block, block by block…”

Because, as Lumumba will tell us, we as Africans must steal Africa back from ourselves.