The Business of Grief

Kenya has always known how to mourn its heroes—with song, dance, ululation, and spectacle. But in the coming days, as Raila Odinga’s final farewell stretches from Kasarani to his ancestral home, a familiar phenomenon is likely to resurface: the professional mourner.

They are the faces you see in every televised burial—those who weep the loudest, collapse with flair, and sometimes “faint” on cue. Their job is simple: to dramatize sorrow, to amplify emotion, to ensure the atmosphere feels as heavy as the loss itself. And with Raila’s passing, the stage could not be bigger.

Why the Demand Is Real

Raila was not just a politician; he was a movement, a myth, a chapter in Kenya’s democratic evolution. His funeral isn’t merely a family affair—it’s a national event, charged with history, politics, and emotion. In such a grand spectacle, everyone wants to look affected.

Enter the professionals. Politicians, religious figures, and even local committees often rely on hired mourners to “set the mood,” ensuring a display of collective grief that matches the occasion’s gravity. For some, it’s about optics. For others, it’s about tradition—because in African mourning culture, silence can look like disrespect.

And with cameras rolling, microphones recording, and live broadcasts streaming across the country, emotional theatre becomes both expected and useful.

When Tears Become a Trade

A quiet economy thrives in the shadows of funerals. Professional mourners—sometimes called “cryers” or “hired wailers”—charge between KSh 1,000 and 5,000 per event depending on their performance level. Some specialize in songs of lament, others in public displays of anguish.

They rehearse phrases, plan entry points, and often arrive in groups to coordinate scenes of grief. A few even travel from county to county, earning a living by doing what many cannot do convincingly—cry on demand.

For a political figure like Raila, whose supporters see him as both leader and liberator, the demand for such theatrics will likely skyrocket. Every faction will want to demonstrate loyalty, every group will want its tears televised, and every appearance will carry symbolic weight.

Politics, Optics, and Manufactured Emotion

The modern Kenyan funeral is no longer just about loss—it’s also about performance. In high-profile send-offs, emotion becomes currency. Politicians use funerals to affirm alliances, communities use them to show presence, and broadcasters turn them into national theatre.

Raila’s farewell, given his stature and history, will be a magnet for such emotional choreography. Expect carefully arranged mourning zones, planned outbursts, and coordinated wails. Not all of it will be genuine—but all of it will serve a purpose.

Behind the tears will lie calculation: visibility, political symbolism, and an effort to appear more connected to “Baba” than the next person.

The Cultural Justification

It’s easy to dismiss paid mourning as insincere, but it’s deeply woven into African communal traditions. In many cultures, mourning is not an individual experience—it’s collective. The louder the wailing, the deeper the respect.

Professional mourners simply institutionalize what was once communal duty. They give sound to collective grief when real mourners are too broken—or too busy—to express it. And in the spectacle of a leader’s funeral, such sounds matter.

For a man whose life inspired both tears and triumph, the crowd’s emotional display—real or staged—will likely be remembered as part of his legend.

The Spectacle Ahead

As Raila’s body moves from city to city, expect the mourning to grow more elaborate. In Kisumu and Bondo, where emotion runs raw, local groups have already begun rehearsing dirges and traditional chants.
Social media influencers are also joining the mix, turning mourning into content—posing beside candle-lit portraits, using captions like “Farewell Baba” and “The last struggle.”

In this blend of genuine grief and calculated performance, the line between sincerity and showbiz will blur completely. But perhaps that’s how Kenya says goodbye to its icons—with both heart and theatre.

A Reflection of the Times

The rise of professional mourners says more about us than about them. It reflects a society that values public display over private sentiment, that measures grief by volume rather than depth. Yet it also shows how emotion—when organized—can bind people together, even if for spectacle.

As Raila Odinga takes his final journey, expect tears—some bought, some borrowed, some painfully real. Because in Kenya’s biggest funerals, mourning isn’t just felt; it’s performed.