Didmus Wekesa Barasa is a Kenyan politician and former Kenya Air Force technical officer who has represented Kimilili Constituency in Bungoma County in the National Assembly since 2017. First elected on a Jubilee Party ticket and re-elected in 2022 under the United Democratic Alliance (UDA), he is part of the Kenya Kwanza coalition aligned with President William Ruto. Before joining politics, Barasa served in the technical wing of the Kenya Defence Forces, then worked in Australia as a corporate manager with Shell and later in regional logistics on his return to East Africa. He has built a reputation as a vocal and combative MP—frequently appearing in the media as a staunch defender of Ruto’s camp, particularly during the Jubilee era “hustler movement” battles, and more recently weighing in on debates over the size and role of presidential advisers. Barasa’s academic and technical training spans engineering, security and public administration. Official parliamentary records and media profiles indicate that he studied at Kimilili Secondary School and undertook technical training at the Kenya Power & Lighting Training School (now the Institute of Energy Studies), before pursuing electrical and electronic engineering at Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT). He later added postgraduate qualifications in areas such as occupational health, security and safety science and security systems audit at Australian universities, and, more recently, degrees in public administration and project management at Mt Kenya University—credentials that underpin his positioning as a technocrat-politician with both technical and governance expertise.  His career has also been marked by major controversy: he was charged with the murder of Brian Olunga, an aide to his 2022 rival, but was acquitted by the High Court in Bungoma in 2023 after the judge found the prosecution evidence insufficient.