14 April 2008
Nairobi — New Deputy Prime Minister Wycliffe Musalia Mudavadi is a humble man in the murky world of politics.
His appointment to one of the newly-created positions in the coalition completes his political comeback from a slump caused by an unwise decision in the 2002 elections.
In that year, he chose to abandon his comrades, among them Prime Minister Raila Odinga and Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka, to become the last and shortest-serving VP in the administration of then President Moi.
He was Uhuru Kenyatta's running-mate in 2002 but in spite of support from Mr Moi and the well-rooted Kanu machinery, they lost the presidential polls and Mr Mudavadi lost his Sabatia seat to neophyte Moses Akaranga.
Mr Kenyatta nominated him to Parliament, but he declined and instead embarked on a two-year soul searching before bouncing back.
Born in September 1960 in Kabarnet, Baringo District, to Mrs Hannah and Mr Moses Budamba Mudavadi, the new Deputy PM joined Parliament in 1989 when he was elected unopposed to the seat left vacant by his father's death. He was 29 at the time.
He was immediately appointed minister for Marketing and Supplies and was never a backbencher until he lost in 2002. Other ministries he has served in are Finance, Agriculture and Transport.
On his return to active politics, Mr Mudavadi disappointed many in Western Province who thought he would join Ford Kenya - then the dominant party in the region.
Instead, he teamed up with former Vice-President Moody Awori and Mr Odinga in the Liberal Democratic Party that was at the time engaged in a supremacy war with the National Alliance Party of Kenya of President Kibaki.
In 2005, he joined the Orange "No" campaign against the referendum on the proposed new Constitution.
Their campaign won and signs that he was on his way to becoming a leading politician increased.
His sobriety stood out clearly at the peak of heated temperatures in ODM-Kenya pitting Mr Odinga against Mr Musyoka. He increasingly emerged as the most likely compromise presidential candidate but the split in the party ended the hostility.
In 2007, the Nairobi University Land Economics graduate sought the nomination of the ODM as a presidential candidate alongside Mr Odinga, William Ruto, Najib Balala and Joseph Nyaga.
He got 391 votes, coming second to Mr Odinga's 2,656 and was named Odinga's running mate in the elections. He also won his Sabatia seat from Mr Akaranga.
Mr Mudavadi is married to Tessy and they have four children.
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