Background
He was born in 1920, at Uyoma in Central Nyanza of a Luo farming family.
He was born in 1920, at Uyoma in Central Nyanza of a Luo farming family.
He was taught by Oginga Odinga at Maseno Secondary School where he was a good athlete.
From 1942 he worked as a meteorological clerk in Nairobi. In 1945 he founded and edited the underground newspaper “Ramogi”, which was published in Nairobi but had growing sales in Nyanza, campaigning for the KAU. When Odinga bought a press in Nairobi, Oneko printed on it.
He helped organise the KAU in Nyanza and in Nairobi was nominated to the municipal council. In 1949 he returned to Nyanza and helped run Odinga’s businesses. Essentially his task was to organise Luo support for KAU, still primarily a Kikuyu organisation. In November 1951 he went to London with Mbiyu Koinange to represent Africans on the land question and returned to the rising wave of pre-Mau Mau agitation.
More militant and younger than his closest colleagues, Oneko became the secretary-general of KAU and was inevitably arrested with Kenyatta in the swoop of October 22, 1952, accused of managing Mau Mau.
Acquitted on appeal to the Supreme Court, he was immediately detained and taken to Manda Island where he was held for four years before being moved to Marsabit. Released in 1961 he was made Kenyatta's personal secretary.
In May 1963 he was returned as member for Nakuru, in the middle of the old “white highlands", and was appointed Minister of Information, Broadcasting and Tourism. The tourism ministry was hived off in 1965, but he remained as Minister of Information until he resigned in 1966 in sympathy with Odinga who had been ousted from the Vice-Presidency, first of the party and then of the State.
Oneko died of a heart attack aged 87 on 9 June 2007 at his home in Kunya village, Rarieda, Bondo District.
The first parliamentary election were held on independence in 1963 and Achieng Oneko won the Nakuru Town Constituency seat.[5] Jomo Kenyatta became the first president of Kenya and soon appointed Achieng Oneko Minister for Information, Broadcasting and Tourism. However, in 1966 Oneko quit the government and joined the newly created Kenya People's Union, a socialist party led by his comrade Oginga Odinga.
In 1969 Oneko was arrested by his former friend Kenyatta following an incident in Kisumu during Kenyatta's visit to the town. Oneko was released in 1975.
Oneko returned to politics in 1992 when he was elected as an MP at the first multiparty elections in Kenya. He represented Ford-Kenya party, led by Oginga Odinga. However, he lost his Rarieda Constituency seat at the next elections held in 1997.
Oneko left a widow Loice Anyango. His eldest wife Jedida died in 1992.[3] He has 11 children, seven sons and four daughters. His oldest son is Dr Ongonga Achieng.