Kenya's two major tribes, the Kikuyu and Luo initially united at the height of their struggle for Independece in the late 1950's and early 1960's, eventually leading the country to Independence in December 1963, with Jomo Kenyatta as Prime Minister. When Kenya became a Republic one year later, Kenyatta became the President and appointed Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, a Luo, as his Vice President.

However, political intrigues and tribal alignments forced Jaramogi Odinga to resign as the country's Vice President in 1966, leaving one powerful fellow Luo, Thomas Joseph Mboya, in the Kenyatta Cabinet. Odinga formed his Opposition party, the Kenya People's Union (KPU) and rallied his Luo against the Kenyatta Government.

But Mboya was assassinated by people believed to be within Kenyatta's inner circle of Government and members of his Kikuyu tribe.

Following Mboya's murder, people around President Kenyatta, and these were mostly his Kikuku people, began a systematic plunder of the county's resources, including grabbing and dishing out land for themselves and their fellow tribesmen, hence the politics of '' it is our turn to eat'' and the perpetual ethnic competition for State House and the Presidency.