Age,Power and Sex in Modern Kenya: A Tale of Two Marriages

This article examines two marriages: one between Kenya's 60-year-old Vice-President, Michael Wamalwa Kijana and 34-year-old Yvonne Nambia and the other between 67-year-old Wambui Otieno, an ex-Mau Mau scout, widow, gender activist and outspoken politician, and 25-year-old Peter Mbugua, a stonemason. Wambui's marriage generated a heated debate both in the country and the Kenyan diasporas. An examination of the public debate and responses that attended the two marriages is suggestive of circulating attitudes towards gender, sex and power in contemporary Kenya. This paper suggests that the response to Wambui's marriage to Mbugua can be understood within a framework of a set of assumptions, values and social truths that form the conventional codes of popular morality in contemporary Kenya.