Kenya’s second president Daniel Toroitich Arap Moi is dead, President Uhuru Kenyatta has announced in a presidential proclamation.
He was 95 years old. His death was confirmed by his press secretary Lee Njiru.
He passed away at night while receiving treatment at Nairobi Hospital.
“It is with profound sadness and sorrow that I announce the passing of a Great African Statesman, H.E. Daniel Toroitich Arap Moi, the Second President of the Republic of Kenya. His Excellency the Former President passed on at the Nairobi Hospital on the early morning of this 4th February 2020; in the presence of his family,” President Kenyatta said in a statement.
According to Wikipedia, Moi became president as a result of the death of the then president Mzee Jomo Kenyatta.
Through popular agitation and external pressures, he was forced to allow multiparty elections in 1991; he led his party, KANU, to victory in the 1992 and 1997 elections. Prior to becoming President, he served as the third Vice President of Kenya from 1967 to 1978.
Moi is popularly known to Kenyans as Nyayo, a Swahili word for “footsteps”, as he often said he was following in the footsteps of the first President, Jomo Kenyatta.
Moi was president of Kenya for 24 years before relinquishing power in 2002 after Kenyans voted him out in a landslide victory for former President Mwai Kibaki.
He also earned the sobriquet “Professor of Politics” due to his long rule of 24 years, the longest in Kenyan history to date
