Nairobi News

Raila Odinga says he has no plans to close down second hand clothes businesses if elected the country’s next president.

Odinga, considered among front runners to win the presidency ahead of the August 2022 polls, made the call in a recent meeting with the industry business.

Commonly referred to as mitumba business, the second hand clothes trade is popular in Kenya, with the wares estimated to be purchased and used by up to 80% of Kenyans.

Odinga also promised to revive the cotton business so as to boost local production of clothes and employment opportunities as compared to mitumba that are mainly imported.

“Our textile industry was killed through liberalization and importation of mitumba,” explained Odinga.

“Cotton was once grown in large numbers in Kenya but that is no longer the case. We will work on that.”

The latest comments are a clarification after Odinga was recently blasted by Deputy President William Ruto, considered his main challenger in the presidential race, for suggesting he will ban mitumba if elected president because the clothes are ‘worn by dead people’ abroad.

“I was speaking of mitumba as an international business. For instance, we have the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) in which Americans have allowed us to sell made in Kenya clothes but on condition we take their old clothes. They’ve put it as a must not a request and that is what I was talking about,” he said.

Odinga clarified that Kenya needs mitumba clothes especially at this time when local industries are struggling.

“We said we shall revive our manufacturing industries, that will take time as we plant cotton, have machines that will manufacture the clothes and the clothes that we are not using we shall be exporting.”