tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/william-ruto-28577/articlesWilliam Ruto – The Conversation2024-03-04T11:47:59Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2243432024-03-04T11:47:59Z2024-03-04T11:47:59ZKenyans use humour to counter unpopular state policies – memes are the latest tool<p>Seemingly disillusioned with the country’s leadership, Kenyans have taken to new ways of expressing their anger and frustration with their government. </p>
<p>On social media and in everyday conversations, President William Ruto is now referred to as Zakayo, named after the infamous <a href="https://www.bible.com/bible/111/LUK.19.1-10.NIV">Zaccheaus</a>, the much-hated chief tax collector in biblical Jericho. </p>
<p>Ruto is also called Kaunda Uongoman, which mimics the stage name of a controversial Congolese musician, <a href="https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/magazines/people-power/wahito-kanda-bongo-man-and-the-story-of-his-kenyan-beauty-1789094">Kanda Bongoman</a>. The first name is a reference to Ruto’s <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-67563308">recent penchant</a> for Kaunda suits. The surname is a portmanteau of the Kiswahili word <em>uongo</em>, meaning liar, and man. </p>
<p>These nicknames are examples of the many humorous but pointed and pithy descriptions now widely used by Kenyans, particularly on social media platforms, to <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329099584_Whatwouldmagufulido_Kenya's_digital_practices_and_individuation_as_a_nonpolitical_act">ridicule and express defiance</a> towards a president and government whose policy decisions have become <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-67694865">deeply unpopular</a>. </p>
<p>Satire and humour have always been legitimate sites for popular engagement with the state in Kenya. But a new weapon in the armoury of those criticising the state is the use of memes. Across social media, Kenyans are employing a range of memes drawn from folk, biblical, global and everyday expressions, as well as videos, screen grabs and photographs riffed off circulating news stories to comment on the government’s failings. </p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/from-advertising-blackmail-to-physical-threats-kenyas-journalists-are-under-attack-but-they-must-also-regain-public-trust-203580">From advertising blackmail to physical threats, Kenya's journalists are under attack – but they must also regain public trust</a>
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<p>Memes have become an <a href="https://berghahnbooks.com/downloads/OpenAccess/BernalCryptopolitics/BernalCryptopolitics_03.pdf">important feature</a> of Kenya’s everyday and discursive political practices. <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1470412914551351">Memes</a> are defined by media scholars Laine Nooney and Laura Portwood-Stacer as</p>
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<p>digital objects that riff on a given visual, textual or auditory form and are then appropriated, re-coded, and slotted back into the infrastructures they came from. </p>
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<p>I have <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=CmVgKXsAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">researched</a> these popular cultural forms particularly within the context of digital media in Africa. I have demonstrated, for example, how <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/23743670.2015.1119490?casa_token=Sue0yxvwcvUAAAAA:dTsuDNJM9KDsFfjWqA7JvO1jupx_WdVmiLg7eKpMGu_7cbbqo-LoBohB6USKYQhGZHtpGfRp2ByF">Twitter</a> has incubated various cultures of popular expression. These create important “<a href="https://www.berghahnbooks.com/downloads/OpenAccess/BernalCryptopolitics/BernalCryptopolitics_03.pdf#page=9">pockets of indiscipline</a>” through which state power is constantly challenged. </p>
<p>Media repression in Kenya has taken new forms. The focus is largely on <a href="https://theconversation.com/from-advertising-blackmail-to-physical-threats-kenyas-journalists-are-under-attack-but-they-must-also-regain-public-trust-203580">invisible tactics</a> that don’t make the state look bad. These range from the use of advertising blackmail to legal instruments often vaguely defined to facilitate misuse. There’s also the creation of a pliant “independent” media council which is <a href="https://mediacouncil.or.ke/index.php/about-us/origins-of-the-council">partly funded by the government</a>. </p>
<p>Memes aren’t completely insulating users from potential state harassment and legal transgressions. Nevertheless, they are making it possible for Kenyans to expand their spaces and boundaries of popular expression, and to navigate some of the existing legal barriers to free expression.</p>
<h2>Resistance legacy in Kenya</h2>
<p>Satire and humour have historically been important forms of political practice in Kenya. The tradition has existed in different forms across various platforms, including broadcast and print media, as well as in popular cultural forms such as music and drama. </p>
<p>For example, in the 1980s and 1990s a satirical newspaper fiction column, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13504630500161581">Wahome Mutahi’s column Whispers</a>, became a must-read. Through satirical and humorous accounts of a fictionalised Kenyan family, Mutahi was able to openly criticise the government, commenting on state policies and failings in a way that mainstream press couldn’t. </p>
<p>This was at the height of the terrifying reign of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/daniel-arap-moi-the-making-of-a-kenyan-big-man-127177">late Kenyan president Daniel arap Moi</a>, when criticism of the government was dangerous. Journalists were routinely jailed, exiled or even killed for it. </p>
<p>Kenyans are again tapping into this history using new media technologies to creatively challenge power. </p>
<p>The political context in the country is different from that of the 1980s. Nevertheless, the government continues to exert influence on mainstream media. Its main means of doing so is through <a href="https://theconversation.com/from-advertising-blackmail-to-physical-threats-kenyas-journalists-are-under-attack-but-they-must-also-regain-public-trust-203580">the control of advertising revenue</a>. The state is the largest single advertiser in the country’s media, and organisations regarded as hostile are denied government advertising. </p>
<p>As a result, social media platforms have become alternative critical debating spaces. This is despite efforts by the state to <a href="https://www.article19.org/resources/kenya-withdraw-proposed-amendments-to-cybercrimes-law/">undermine free speech</a> in various communication platforms. </p>
<p>As rights group <a href="https://www.article19.org/resources/kenya-harmonise-free-expression-with-iccpr-recommendations/">Article 19</a> has argued, content-based restrictions on free expression that are incompatible with international human rights law and standards remain in Kenya’s penal code. Another problematic law is the <a href="http://kenyalaw.org/kl/fileadmin/pdfdownloads/Acts/ComputerMisuseandCybercrimesActNo5of2018.pdf">Computer Misuse and Cybercrimes Act</a>, which the government has routinely used to punish those on social media exposing instances of state corruption. <a href="https://mediainnovationnetwork.org/2022/04/07/the-legal-challenges-facing-east-africas-bloggers-and-influencers/">Bloggers and political activists</a> have been subjected to some of these laws.</p>
<h2>Game of cat and mouse</h2>
<p>In an environment where the government seems determined to control public communication spaces, and has the means to do so, alternative cultures of defiance that have been known to elude state capture should thrive.</p>
<p>Yet, even as the use of memes, especially for political accountability, proliferates, there is always the fear that the state can simply ignore their spread and “vitality”, or appropriate them. This would weaken their subversive intent. For example, during a recent foreign trip to Japan, <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2024-02-08-ruto-i-dont-mind-being-called-zakayo-but/">Ruto “accepted”</a> his nickname Zakayo, insisting that he wouldn’t backtrack on his unpopular tax policies. </p>
<p>When the state takes “ownership” of this language of resistance, it presents an interesting paradox, one which the Cameroonian scholar Achille Mbembe once likened to a form of “<a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/africa/article/abs/provisional-notes-on-the-postcolony/BE5FFE3AC0DB10125B69E0D63E36DD89">mutual zombification</a>”. This is where the ruler and the ruled “rob each other of their vitality, leaving both impotent”. </p>
<p>In other words, none is left the stronger.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/224343/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>George Ogola does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Satire and humour have always been sites for popular engagement with the state in Kenya.George Ogola, Professor of Media Industries, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2180972023-12-12T09:10:47Z2023-12-12T09:10:47ZWhat’s east Africa’s position on the Israel-Hamas war? An expert unpacks the reactions of Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda<p>The reactions of some east African countries to the ongoing conflict in Gaza have been less dramatic than South Africa’s. South Africa’s parliament has passed a resolution calling for the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/safrican-lawmakers-vote-suspend-diplomatic-ties-with-israel-shut-embassy-2023-11-21/">closure</a> of its embassy in Tel Aviv. Algeria and South Africa have been the most supportive of the Palestinians. Thus far only South Africa and Chad have withdrawn their representatives from Tel Aviv.</p>
<p>In contrast, the reactions from east African capitals have been less dramatic. At the outset of the current conflict in Gaza, Kenya’s President William Ruto <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-10-08-kenya-stands-with-israel-ruto-says-amidst-war-with-palestine/">expressed solidarity</a> with Israel and condemned</p>
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<p>terrorism and attacks on innocent civilians in the country.</p>
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<p><a href="https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/news/national/museveni-reacts-as-hamas-attack-on-israel-spirals-4393308">Uganda</a> and <a href="https://www.thecitizen.co.tz/tanzania/news/national/tanzania-calls-for-peace-as-israel-palestine-war-intensifies-4394110">Tanzania</a> condemned all forms of violence and called for</p>
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<p>restraint to stem further loss of human life.</p>
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<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Michael+Bishku+research&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart">scholar</a> of Middle Eastern and African history, I have researched the relationship between Israel and African countries including those in <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/312006990_Israel's_Relations_with_the_East_African_States_of_Kenya_Uganda_and_Tanzania_-_From_Independence_to_the_Present">east Africa</a>. </p>
<p>It is my conclusion that the reactions of the east African states to the conflict in the Middle East are shaped by two things: the perceived national threat of terrorism by Islamist factions and, for those states with democratic institutions, domestic public opinion.</p>
<p>In my view these three countries are unlikely to change their stance unless the current conflict escalates. On the one hand they will continue to limit their actions to voting in the United Nations for resolutions in support of the Palestinians. On the other they will continue to solicit technical assistance – especially in agriculture and security – from Israel.</p>
<h2>The history</h2>
<p>Relations between African countries and Israel have been tested before. For example, in 1973, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/20455585">25 independent African states</a> cut diplomatic relations with Israel after its occupation of Egyptian territory. These included east African states, such as Kenya, which had enjoyed particularly <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/a-history-of-africa-israel-relations/a-43395892">close relations</a> with Israel since its independence from Britain in 1963.</p>
<p>East African countries colonised by Britain <a href="https://studies.aljazeera.net/en/reports/2016/09/israeli-penetration-east-africa-objectives-risks-160929102604246.html">sought</a> technical assistance after independence. This was particularly true in agriculture. They viewed Israel as complementary or an alternative to having to seek assistance from the big powers.</p>
<p>When African states cut off the diplomatic ties with Israel in 1973, Kenya was reluctant but had to act in solidarity with other independent African nations. It kept its cooperation with Israel even before the formal ties were restored in 1988. It facilitated Israel’s <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Entebbe-raid">1974 rescue operation</a> at Uganda’s Entebbe airport. The operation was meant to rescue passengers of a French jet airliner that was hijacked on its way from Israel to France, and flown to Entebbe. </p>
<p>Tanzania, on the other hand, sought a more neutral course after independence. It found the socialist character of the Israeli Labour governments appealing but Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories following the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Six-Day-War">1967 Six-Day War</a> complicated relations. </p>
<p>Tanzania was one of the last African states to <a href="https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/1481841?ln=en">renew</a> relations with Israel in 1994. That was a year after the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Oslo-Accords">Oslo Accords</a> between Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation. Tanzania was also the <a href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200605-palestine-julius-nyerere-and-international-solidarity/">first African country</a> to recognise the Palestinian Liberation Organisation in 1973 and to host a representative office in its capital. </p>
<p>Uganda has had the most tempestuous relationship with Israel. Under the erratic <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Idi-Amin">Idi Amin</a> the country broke off relations with Israel and embraced Libya. Israel and Uganda have had good relations under President Yoweri Museveni. Israeli companies <a href="https://embassies.gov.il/nairobi/bilateral-relations/Pages/Israel-and-Uganda.aspx">currently operate</a> in Uganda’s construction, infrastructure, agriculture and water management, communications and technology sectors.</p>
<p>Uganda joined most other African countries in <a href="https://truman.huji.ac.il/publications/uganda-and-israel-history-complex-relationship">renewing</a> relations with Israel just after the end of the Cold War.</p>
<p>Uganda, along with Kenya, has militarily intervened in Somalia as part of an African Union mission. </p>
<p>The ebbs and flows of these relationships have to be seen against the backdrop of the hard work Israel has put in to building <a href="https://jewishstudies.washington.edu/israel-hebrew/benjamin-netanyahu-resetting-israel-africa-relations/">diplomatic relations</a> with a range of other African countries too. By 2023 it had ties with 46 of the <a href="https://au.int/">55 African Union member states</a>.</p>
<h2>National security threat</h2>
<p>Kenya has been affected by instability in neighbouring Somalia and has been the victim of terror attacks. </p>
<p>In 1998, al Qaeda attacks <a href="https://press.un.org/en/1998/19980813.sc6559.html">targeted</a> the US embassy in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. The Nairobi attack <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/kenya-victims-of-1998-us-embassy-bombing-demand-compensation-/7215264.html">resulted</a> in over 200 deaths and thousands of people were injured. Since then, Israel <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/23/nairobi-attack-israel-advising-kenyan-forces">has taken the lead</a> among foreign countries in aiding and advising Kenyan security.</p>
<p>Kenya has suffered attacks since then by al-Shabaab – across its <a href="https://theconversation.com/five-reasons-why-militants-are-targeting-kenyas-lamu-county-176519">border</a> as well as in <a href="https://www.state.gov/reports/country-reports-on-terrorism-2019/kenya/">Nairobi</a> in 2019. </p>
<p>Tanzania’s security situation has been different. Unlike Kenya, Tanzania has not militarily intervened in Somalia as part of an African Union mission (Amisom). The mission has been operating since 2007 to provide security in that country in the Horn of Africa.</p>
<p>Uganda has its own set of security problems. A terrorist bombing in Uganda’s capital Kampala in 2010 was <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2010/7/13/al-shabab-claims-uganda-bombings">attributed</a> to al-Shabaab. But a bigger threat to Uganda’s security has come from Islamist rebels known as the <a href="https://theconversation.com/tracking-the-drcs-allied-democratic-forces-and-its-links-to-isis-116439">Allied Democratic Forces</a> based in the Democratic Republic of Congo. </p>
<h2>Domestic institutions and public opinion</h2>
<p>There is one other factor that explains east Africa’s relations with Israel: the religious composition of populations in the region. </p>
<p>Israel is <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/truth-many-evangelical-christians-support-israel-rcna121481">popular</a> with many devout Christians in east Africa, as is the case throughout the continent. If given the opportunity, these Christians would make a pilgrimage to the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/israelstudies.23.1.09">Holy Land</a>. This factor obviously affects <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/israel-in-africa-9781786995056/">public opinion</a>. </p>
<p>Conversely, Muslims in east Africa have a greater concern for the situation of the Palestinians. All three countries – Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania – have populations adhering to these two religions. </p>
<p>Given the democratic characters of Kenya and Tanzania, where there have been peaceful transfers of power, public opinion has more of an impact. This explains Ruto’s <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/president-ruto-changes-tune-on-israel-hamas-conflict-4431560">change of tone</a> after the initial statement strongly critical of Hamas.</p>
<p>Tanzania has remained consistent in condemning all forms of violence. That country calls for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as do the other east African states. </p>
<p>Public pressure is less important in Uganda, where Museveni is quite autocratic.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218097/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael B. Bishku does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>East Africa’s reaction to the war in Gaza appears shaped by history, affinity to the policies of the west and the threat of terrorism.Michael B. Bishku, Professor of Middle Eastern and African History, Augusta UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2181332023-11-23T11:45:14Z2023-11-23T11:45:14ZIf Kenya wants to help Haiti, it should push for colonial reparations not send in the police<p><em>As the security situation in Haiti deteriorates, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/kenyas-parliament-approves-police-deployment-haiti-2023-11-16/">Kenya</a> has offered to lead a new sort of UN mission to the country from 2024. In early October, the UN Security Council <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/02/haiti-un-security-force-kenya-gangs">authorised a Multinational Security Support mission</a> led by Kenya to confront the paramilitary-style gangs that control the capital city of Port-au-Prince and other parts of the Caribbean country.</em> </p>
<p><em>We asked <a href="http://www.jennygreenburg.com/research.html">Jennifer Greenburg</a>, who researches the effects of peacekeeping interventions in Haiti, some questions.</em></p>
<h2>What is the context in Haiti?</h2>
<p>The Multinational Security Support mission is a new form of international intervention. It’s authorised under <a href="https://www.un.org/en/about-us/un-charter/chapter-7">Chapter Seven</a> of the UN Charter. However, it’s not formally a peacekeeping mission, which would be composed of peacekeeping forces and (theoretically) regulated according to <a href="https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/standards-of-conduct">UN standards of conduct</a>.</p>
<p>The reticence to call this intervention a peacekeeping mission is a product of recent history. The <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2019/10/15/as-the-un-leaves-haiti-its-victims-still-wait-for-justice">last major UN peacekeeping mission</a> in Haiti – known by its French acronym <a href="https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/mission/minustah">Minustah</a> and which ran from 2004 to 2017 – was responsible for <a href="https://www.fidh.org/IMG/pdf/KeepingthepeaceJusticiaGlobal-4.pdf">killing civilians</a>. Peacekeepers fired machine guns from helicopters in the name of combating gangs in 2005. </p>
<p>Further, after Haiti’s devastating 2010 earthquake, faulty sanitation practices at a UN peacekeepers’ base introduced a <a href="https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/documents/pdf/Clinics/Haiti_TDC_Final_Report.pdf#page=6">cholera</a> strain in the country that killed at least 10,000 people. </p>
<p>Peacekeepers also <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/01/11/un-peacekeeping-has-sexual-abuse-problem">raped</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/they-put-a-few-coins-in-your-hands-to-drop-a-baby-in-you-265-stories-of-haitian-children-abandoned-by-un-fathers-114854">sexually abused</a> Haitians.</p>
<p>It’s no mystery why nobody wants to see blue helmets arrive in Haiti again. </p>
<p>The new mission is to be led by Kenya with troops participating from other Caribbean countries, such as Jamaica, the Bahamas, Antigua and Barbuda. The US has <a href="https://apnews.com/article/haiti-violence-united-nations-4acd3429d1bd84020efac538ba6c8746">pledged</a> US$100 million. </p>
<p>More than <a href="https://apnews.com/article/haiti-gang-violence-un-report-killings-5d3f7ff272b7303852869dfc67692a23">2,700 people</a> in Haiti have been reported murdered and 1,472 kidnapped in the eight months to June 2023, according to the UN. The numbers are likely to be higher. They don’t include indirect deaths caused by inadequate access to healthcare and nutrition, which is exacerbated by insecurity.</p>
<h2>What will the Kenyan police confront in Haiti?</h2>
<p>The question of whether they will go is still not decided.</p>
<p>Kenya’s <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-67437951">parliament</a> has approved the mission but a court hearing on its constitutionality is scheduled for 26 January 2024. </p>
<p>If Kenya does deploy to Haiti, its police officers will confront a <a href="https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501746994/street-sovereigns/">complex</a> web of <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/gangs-take-control-in-haiti-as-democracy-withers">more than 200 paramilitary-style criminal gangs</a>. They control territory across the capital city of Port-au-Prince and many other areas of the country. </p>
<p>Haiti’s insecurity and poverty are rooted in its punishment for winning freedom from racial slavery in 1804. <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-france-extorted-haiti-the-greatest-heist-in-history-137949">France forced Haiti</a> to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/20/world/americas/haiti-history-colonized-france.html">repay</a> French slaveholders. This instigated a cycle of indebtedness and is how Haiti became, in the words of Haitian poet <a href="https://www.usip.org/publications/2008/12/toward-end-poverty-haiti#:%7E:text=In%20July%202006%2C%20Haitian%20poet,as%20described%20in%20the%20media.">Jean-Claude Martineau</a>, the only country with a last name: “the <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/haiti/overview">poorest country</a> in the western hemisphere”.</p>
<p>Security was already in crisis before the 2021 <a href="https://theconversation.com/slain-haitian-president-faced-calls-for-resignation-sustained-mass-protests-before-killing-164131">assassination of de facto president Jovenel Moïse</a>. Today, gangs control about <a href="https://apnews.com/article/haiti-gangs-democracy-at-risk-7ddcea955fdd364e2b574e28daa71d03">two-thirds</a> of the country, which has a population of <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.TOTL?locations=HT">11.6 million</a>. </p>
<p>There are more <a href="https://nacla.org/news/2021/political-anatomy-haiti-armed-gangs">guns</a> in Haiti now than before the last peacekeeping mission that ended in 2017. Like Haitian police, Kenyan police may find themselves <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/02/haiti-cops-outgunned-gangs">outgunned</a> by gangs who control (and trade in) vast troves of weapons.</p>
<p>Without in-depth knowledge of a complex and volatile situation, Kenyan police will somehow have to distinguish civilians from gang members, and gang members from police. </p>
<p>The notorious leader of the “G-9 Family and Allies”, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/10/21/who-is-haitis-sanctioned-gang-leader-jimmy-barbecue-cherizier">Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier</a>, is a former police officer. Lines between police, government and gangs are deliberately blurred. </p>
<p>Chérizier is one of multiple gangsters, police officers and government officials implicated in the <a href="https://hrp.law.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Killing_With_Impunity-1.pdf">2018 massacre</a> of at least 70 civilians.</p>
<p>After the assassination of <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-57762246">Moïse</a>, the same political party responsible for this and <a href="https://web.rnddh.org/massacres-in-bel-air-and-cite-soleil-under-the-indifferent-gaze-of-state-authorities/?lang=en">multiple other massacres</a> remains in power. It continues to collude with gangs. </p>
<p>The Kenyan mission is allegedly coming to Haiti at the <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/3/why-kenya-volunteered-to-lead-un-mission-to-haiti">request</a> of the Haitian government. But this government <a href="https://nacla.org/haiti-jovenel-moise-assassination-social-movements">doesn’t represent Haitian people</a>. It has massacred civilians by supplying gangs with information, weapons and uniforms through the police. </p>
<p>There is also a language issue: Kenyan troops speak English and Swahili. Haitians speak Krèyol and French.</p>
<h2>What are the concerns about Kenya’s police?</h2>
<p>The security support mission to Haiti will largely comprise Kenyan police, whom Kenyan civilians have described as treating them “<a href="https://theworld.org/stories/2016-05-23/police-officers-treat-nairobi-neighborhood-atm-machine-residents-say">like ATM machines</a>”. Extrajudicial <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20230601015425/https://www.matharesocialjustice.org/who-is-next/">executions</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-art-of-bribery-a-closeup-look-at-how-traffic-officers-operate-on-kenyas-roads-185551">extortion</a> and <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/kenya-police-have-killed-15-people-injured-31-in-covid-19-curfew-enforcement-ipoa-334522">abuse</a> are well-documented practices of the police force now charged with restoring legitimate policing in Haiti. </p>
<h2>What’s in it for Kenya?</h2>
<p>Kenya stands to benefit economically from leading the mission. In September, the US and Kenya signed a <a href="https://apnews.com/article/kenya-united-states-haiti-defense-austin-ed1496d72b426011f3e8a36a971ca12d">defence agreement</a> that gives Kenya resources and support to fight <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-al-shabaab-targets-kenya-and-what-the-country-can-do-about-it-87371">Al-Shabaab</a>. </p>
<p>Kenya’s own <a href="https://mod.go.ke/kenyas-peace-keeping-missions/#:%7E:text=Kenya%20has%20however%20remained%20cautious,little%20in%20peace%20enforcement%20operations.">defence ministry</a> has publicly stated that UN missions provide</p>
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<p>a rare opportunity to obtain UN allowances that are ordinarily not offered by the KDF (Kenya Defence Forces). </p>
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<p>Peacekeeping missions have also been an opportunity to gain international <a href="https://www.academia.edu/86172749/The_Strong_Arm_and_the_Friendly_Hand_Military_Humanitarianism_in_Post_earthquake_Haiti">credibility</a>, as my research in Haiti has shown. </p>
<h2>If not policing, what’s the best approach to solving Haiti’s crisis?</h2>
<p>Change in Haiti will not come through yet another UN or <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/11/07/haiti-kenya-invasion-gang-war-united-states/">outsourced</a> US intervention. </p>
<p>Speaking after UN approval of the Haiti mission, Kenya’s president William Ruto <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boCWMX3t0h8">said</a> Haitians were being punished for “choosing to be free human beings”. He was referring to the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Haitian-Revolution">country’s independence in 1804</a>. </p>
<p>In 2013, Britain agreed to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/06/uk-compensate-kenya-mau-mau-torture">compensate</a> 5,228 Kenyans who were tortured during the Mau Mau uprising against the colonial regime in the 1950s. Although the money hardly restores the dignity and livelihoods lost through colonialism, the decision to settle and award each claimant approximately US$4,000 is historic. </p>
<p>Real change for Haiti would begin with reparations. </p>
<p>If international bodies would only listen, <a href="https://www.haitiwatch.org/home/commissionforhaitiansolution">Haitian groups</a> representing broad swathes of civil society have been <a href="https://theworld.org/stories/2021-11-22/it-us-haitians-find-solution-haiti-crisis-adviser-says">vocal</a> about <a href="https://akomontana.ht/en/home/">what they want</a> and their <a href="https://www.democracynow.org/2023/10/4/haiti_united_nations_forces">opposition</a> to a Kenyan-led intervention. </p>
<p>Money owed and respect deserved would be a more productive first step forward than <a href="https://jonathanmkatz.com/bigtruck">recycling</a> <a href="https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/killing-with-kindness/9780813553634/">pages</a> from the international community’s <a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250284679/aidstate">playbook</a>. We need only look at Haiti today to see what violence this playbook has wrought.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218133/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer Greenburg receives funding from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. She has previously received funding from the National Science Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, the Association of American Geographers, Stanford University, the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University, and the Department of Geography and the Graduate Division at the University of California, Berkeley. She is the author of At War with Women: Military Humanitarianism and Imperial Feminism in an Era of Permanent War (Cornell University Press).
</span></em></p>The security situation in Haiti must change – but another UN intervention may not be the way this happens.Jennifer Greenburg, Lecturer in International Relations, University of SheffieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2175232023-11-19T07:53:40Z2023-11-19T07:53:40ZKenya’s stock market has suffered steepest losses in the world: an expert view on why and how to reverse it<p>Kenya’s <a href="https://www.nse.co.ke/">stock market</a> <a href="https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/kenya-s-stock-market-becomes-world-s-worst-performer-1.1979077">recently</a> suffered steep losses, making it the worst performing globally. The weak performance has persisted: the Nairobi Securities Exchange 20-share index stood at about 1420 on 10 November 2023, having <a href="https://tradingeconomics.com/kenya/stock-market">fallen</a> from 1509 on 29 September 2023, a drop of 6% over the six-week period. In better days, the index has <a href="https://tradingeconomics.com/kenya/stock-market">risen</a> above the psychological 5000 mark: for example, it was 5491 on 23 February 2015. </p>
<p>The stock market matters for the Kenyan public for several reasons. First, <a href="https://www.oecd.org/daf/fin/private-pensions/2021-Survey-Investment-Regulation-Pension-Funds-and-Other-Pension-Providers.pdf#page=81">up to 70%</a> of the retirement savings of Kenyans may be invested in the stock market. So the market’s <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/kenya-stocks-idAFL8N1PB1VN">weakness</a> might inhibit retirement funds from meeting their pension obligations. Second, many Kenyan companies use the stock market to raise capital and weak market performance discourages them from doing so. </p>
<p>Given these benefits, it is important to understand reasons for stock market value fluctuations. Here, I discuss some possible reasons for the market’s dismal performance and suggest possible ways to reverse the trend. </p>
<h2>What moves markets</h2>
<p>Stock prices move in response to new information that conveys signals about the risks faced by investors. The new information may be something that an investor has uncovered, or that is known by company insiders (although trading on that knowledge is usually <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1566014119304352">illegal</a>), or that is announced publicly by an authority like the central bank.</p>
<p>New information may be about something unique to the company, or something that affects the entire market. New information about a company often affects the company’s price without affecting the market index. However, in small markets such as Kenya’s, where the market index may reflect the presence of a few large companies (such as <a href="https://www.safaricom.co.ke/investor-relations-landing/stocks/shares">Safaricom</a> and <a href="https://markets.ft.com/data/equities/tearsheet/summary?s=KCB:NAI">KCB</a>), changes in the price of one firm’s stock may cause a noticeable change on the index value.</p>
<h2>What ails Kenya’s stock market?</h2>
<p>An important risk factor that affects the entire market is sovereign (country) risk. Sovereign risk may be responsible for the <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/markets/capital-markets/foreign-investors-dump-over-four-billion-nse-shares--4165110">persistent selling off</a> of shares by international investors at the Nairobi bourse in recent months. </p>
<p>When there are more investors selling shares than those willing to buy, share prices, and the market index, fall. This is because sellers must lower their prices to appeal to the few buyers. In 2022, Kenya’s international investors <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/foreign-investors-pull-out-sh24-billion-from-nse-in-2022--4075842">sold</a> about US$158 million (KES 24 billion) worth of shares, slightly lower than the US$191 million recorded during 2020. </p>
<p>The sell-off may indicate deep-seated political issues affecting Kenya’s economy. These include fears of possible instability post-2022 presidential elections. The country has previously <a href="https://www.csis.org/blogs/smart-global-health/post-election-violence-kenya-and-its-aftermath">experienced</a> election related violence. </p>
<p>The sell-off may also speak to economic factors. For instance, when US interest rates increase, <a href="https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FEDFUNDS">as they have</a>, international investors tend to pull their money out of developing markets and invest it in US debt markets, a phenomenon called <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1540496X.2022.2103399">flight to quality</a>. </p>
<p>Indeed, anecdotal evidence suggests that emerging stock markets <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-09-26/dollar-gains-heap-pressure-on-emerging-market-stocks-currencies#xj4y7vzkg">slumped to their lowest</a> between March and September 2023 driven by expectations that US interest rates would remain high.</p>
<p>Third, the stock market jitters may be explained by the weakening Kenyan shilling. For international investors, investing in a Kenyan stock means taking a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ememar.2014.08.005">risk</a> on both the stock and the value of the Kenyan shilling. If the shilling falls in value relative to the investor’s domestic currency (like the US dollar), it may wipe out all the gains on the stock and cause the investor to lose money. </p>
<p>The Kenya shilling lost 21% of <a href="https://za.investing.com/currencies/usd-kes-historical-data?end_date=1699712214&st_date=1662933600">its value</a> between 13 September 2022 and 10 November 2023. This has been largely attributed to capital flight and <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/business/kenyan-shilling-hits-new-low-against-dollar-4220396">reduced</a> inflow of foreign currency due to the low value of exports. </p>
<p>Then there’s Kenya’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-has-breached-its-public-debt-ceiling-how-it-got-there-and-what-that-means-190006">burgeoning public debt</a>. It’s the chicken-and-egg story: a falling shilling increases the burden of debt owed to outside lenders. And the rising cost of servicing debt in a foreign currency increases the supply of the shilling in the currency markets, weakening it further.</p>
<p>In an attempt to stem the slide in the shilling’s value, keep domestic inflation in check, and respond to rising US interest rates, Central Bank of Kenya, like its counterparts globally, has chosen to restrict money supply. </p>
<p>Consequently, the central bank rate, a policy interest rate that guides domestic loan pricing, <a href="https://www.centralbank.go.ke/statistics/interest-rates/">has increased</a> from 7% in March 2022 to 10.5% in November 2023. When interest rates rise, returns (yields) on debt assets like bonds also rise, making them more attractive than stocks. This induces investors to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261560618305722?via%3Dihub">move</a> their money from stocks to bonds, causing a decline in stock prices. </p>
<h2>Expectations</h2>
<p>An important recent development is the enactment of Kenya’s <a href="https://kra.go.ke/images/publications/The-Finance-Act--2023.pdf">Finance Act</a> in June 2023. The Act imposes new taxes and tax increases. The World Bank <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/business/world-bank-urges-caution-on-new-levies-4268024">has warned</a> that higher taxation may discourage investment and increase unemployment. </p>
<p>So there’s an expectation of weaker economic performance and, concomitantly, weaker company performance (due, for example, to lower product demand). The expectation of weaker company performance causes investors to anticipate lower future cash flows (like dividends), which is reflected in lower company valuations today. </p>
<p>Expectations about public debt also matter for companies. Kenya is expected to borrow more, which will increase interest rates on government debt, making it more lucrative for banks to lend to the government than to the private sector. Reduced private sector lending discourages private investments and lowers company valuations.</p>
<h2>What should be done?</h2>
<p>There is no quick fix to a stock market collapse. Although stock market performance may be driven by <a href="https://pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/jep.21.2.129">sentiment</a> in the short run, it is more beneficial to think long-term. </p>
<p>There’s a close relationship between the broader economy and the stock market. So, as a <a href="https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4011-0728">finance scholar</a>, I offer only one recommendation: diversify and grow the economy. </p>
<p>There is clear evidence of the long-term economic growth benefits of investing in human capital, boosting a country’s <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048733317300215">entrepreneurial orientation</a> and <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1879933716301798">investing in infrastructure</a>. To grow the economy, therefore, the government’s policymakers should draw from such evidence. </p>
<p>Importantly, the need to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1574068405010063">strengthen the country’s institutions</a> has never been stronger. This will have the effect of improving governance and accountability as well as investor confidence. With such actions, the stock market needs no intervention.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217523/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Odongo Kodongo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The negative investor sentiment and massive capital flight could be reversed by improved governance and accountability.Odongo Kodongo, Associate professor, Finance, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2151712023-11-13T01:10:58Z2023-11-13T01:10:58ZWilliam Ruto’s first year: he promised to make life easier for Kenyans, but things got worse<p>It’s more than a year since President William Ruto was <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/william-ruto-sworn-in-as-kenya-s-fifth-president--3947134#:%7E:text=Tuesday%20September%2013%202022&text=Dr%20William%20Ruto%20has%20been,and%20the%20registrar%20Anne%20Amadi">sworn into office</a> as Kenya’s fifth president. He assumed power at a time when Kenya was beset by rising food and fuel prices, high unemployment and a worrying <a href="https://kippra.or.ke/enhancing-public-debt-management-in-kenya/">debt burden</a>. </p>
<p>During the election campaign, Ruto promised to fix an economy afflicted by <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/government-t-if-kenya-loses-2-billion-daily-to-corruption--4406504">corruption</a> and <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/uhuru-helpless-in-fight-against-graft-mudavadi-145707">ineptitude</a>. He promised to entrench good governance and place the poor <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-58246207">at the centre</a> of economic policy. He pledged to address <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/dp-says-he-will-not-negotiate-with-ethnic-kingpins-as-he-eyes-2022-presidency-10993118">ethnicised politics</a> and to <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/its-the-rule-of-law-not-man-ruto-says-as-he-presides-over-swearing-in-of-6-judges-n305649">uphold</a> constitutionalism and the rule of law. </p>
<p>Ruto’s promises were significant. The rule of law and constitutionalism are key to economic planning and development, governance and equitable sharing of national resources. They are the guardrails against impunity, democratic backsliding, lawlessness and political instability. Throughout Kenya’s postcolonial period, the political elite have exploited ethnicity to obtain power at the expense of the collective wellbeing and social cohesion. Elite entitlement has also weakened state institutions, leading to corruption and impunity. </p>
<p>I have studied democratic transitions, conflict and state building and elections in Africa. My 2018 <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-319-65295-5">book</a> examined how the political class had exploited ethnicity for political and economic advantage, resulting in weak and even dysfunctional state institutions in Kenya. </p>
<p>In his election campaign Ruto identified the major issues that required urgent attention. He addressed issues that needed swift action without constitutional changes, such as thawing the tension between the executive and the judiciary, decoupling the police finances from the executive, and taking port operations back to the coastal city of Mombasa from the inland town of Naivasha. But resolving Kenya’s economic hardships has proved a hard nut to crack, as his 9 November 2023 state of the nation address <a href="https://www.capitalfm.co.ke/news/2023/11/president-ruto-vows-to-tackle-soaring-cost-of-living-in-inaugural-state-of-the-nation-address/#:%7E:text=NAIROBI%2C%20Kenya%2C%20Nov%208%20%E2%80%93,place%20to%20achieve%20this%20goal.">acknowledged</a>. Just over a year since he was sworn in, Ruto is no nearer to turning the Kenyan ship around. </p>
<h2>Economic turbulence</h2>
<p>As a candidate, Ruto portrayed himself as an <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-58246207">outsider</a> to Kenya’s power matrix who was best placed to improve the living conditions of the poor and excluded. But the economy has not improved under his watch. If anything, living conditions have <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20221221-life-is-worse-kenya-s-ruto-marks-100-days-in-office">worsened</a>.</p>
<p>The cost of living is higher after a steep increase in the petrol price and the local currency’s loss of value. Ruto’s government has imposed <a href="https://apnews.com/article/kenya-tax-increases-economy-ruto-d69cdbb21d5fd7cff4a6a406736f6bdd">new and increased taxes</a> on Kenyans, ostensibly to reduce or remove the need for external borrowing.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/william-ruto-is-now-in-charge-of-kenyas-shaky-economy-where-to-start-190454">William Ruto is now in charge of Kenya’s shaky economy: where to start</a>
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<p>The government was quick to remove <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/15/kenyas-new-president-scraps-petrol-subsidy">fuel</a> and <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/no-more-unga-subsidies-for-kenyans-president-ruto-says-n305820">food</a> subsidies, but has been slow to address <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/wastage-wont-be-tolerated-president-ruto-says-as-he-orders-ministries-to-cut-budgets-by-10-percent-n328610">government wastage</a>. </p>
<p>The government key strategy was to <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-11-09-ruto-subsidising-fertiliser-a-masterstroke-in-lowering-cost-of-living/">subsidise</a> fertiliser to boost harvests and achieve food security. It remains to be seen whether this will happen. More deliberate measures are required to turn around agriculture as the mainstay of the economy. </p>
<p>On the question of centring the poor and marginalised in governance, Ruto focused on the financial sector. The government rolled out the <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-11-09-ruto-hustler-fund-has-exceeded-peoples-expectations/">“Hustler Fund”</a> to make credit more affordable.</p>
<p>But the fund’s impact on overall living standards through job creation, for instance, is likely to be cancelled out by a punitive tax regime and a struggling economy. </p>
<h2>Rule of law</h2>
<p>Ruto’s first public event as president was to <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/president-ruto-appoints-six-judges-rejected-by-uhuru-kenyatta-3947510">approve</a> the appointment of six judges <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/national/article/2001414750/heartbreak-for-six-judges-as-uhuru-rejects-their-appointment#:%7E:text=A%20statement%20from%20State%20House,to%20meet%20the%20required%20threshold%E2%80%9D.">left in limbo</a> by his predecessor, Uhuru Kenyatta. He also made good on his promise to allocate more funding to the judiciary.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/william-ruto-how-kenyas-new-president-took-on-powerful-political-dynasties-178787">William Ruto: how Kenya's new president took on powerful political dynasties</a>
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<p>However, to entrench the rule of law and constitutionalism calls for more than this. Judicial officers must act with utmost integrity. To affirm equality before the law, errant senior state officers and the political elite must face the law and if found guilty sanctioned decisively.</p>
<p>The Kenyan judiciary is still <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/articles/overwhelming-majority-kenyans-see-corruption-judiciary-afrobarometer-survey-shows/">bedevilled by corruption</a> that impedes access to justice. Disturbingly, it is seen as more inclined to punishing the poor while letting the rich and political elite act with impunity. Ruto himself has <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-07-03-blow-to-ruto-as-high-court-terms-creation-of-50-cass-illegal/">obeyed</a> court rulings that went against him, unlike under Kenyatta, when <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/health/national/article/2001452909/defying-courts-set-uhuru-kenyatta-on-collision-course-with-judiciary">disregard</a> for the law was the norm. Critics, however, including the Law Society of Kenya, have <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/president-william-ruto-on-spot-over-defiance-of-courts-3985948">accused</a> his administration of disobeying court orders like his predecessor.</p>
<p>Ruto <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/no-kenyan-will-go-through-extrajudicial-killings-ever-again-president-ruto-n318192">spoke out</a> against extrajudicial and summary executions and enforced disappearances perfected by the police over the years. He sought to accord the police financial and operational autonomy. Thus he transferred accounting for the police budget to the police as he had promised.</p>
<p>Despite these changes, a culture of impunity and lack of transparency continues to undermine the Kenyan police. Extrajudicial executions continue. The police must be placed under <a href="https://www.chrips.or.ke/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Local-Policing-Accountability-in-Kenya.pdf">civilian oversight</a> as envisaged under the constitution. </p>
<p>The failure to set up a commission of inquiry into state capture under his predecessor, as promised during campaigns, dented Ruto’s commitment to the fight against corruption. A year later, a commission of inquiry has not been formed and the issue seems to have been abandoned altogether. </p>
<p>It is unlikely that Ruto will fulfil his manifesto unless he reins in runaway corruption and the culprits are held to account. The rule of law demands that proceeds of crime be recovered and offenders charged for economic sabotage. This approach would obviate the need to burden Kenyans with taxes and more borrowing.</p>
<h2>National cohesion</h2>
<p>Appointments to government positions have been undermined by the age-old problems of <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/health/politics/article/2001467756/storm-over-cas-shortlist-full-of-oldies">recycling appointees</a>, <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/taxman-in-bid-to-withdraw-tax-evasion-claims-against-ca-chair--4044370">patronage</a>, <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/politics/article/2001437466/dp-ruto-faces-criticism-over-nepotism-claims">nepotism</a>and <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/310735/kenya-ruto-accused-of-tribal-and-political-bias-in-state-appointments/">ethnicity</a>. Just as worrying are senior government officials publicly advancing <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-10-08-gachagua-i-am-unapologetic-over-shareholder-remarks/">exclusionary ethnic politics</a> with impunity. Ruto must rein them in. </p>
<p>It is also a setback that Ruto acceded to <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/it-is-illegal-court-told-as-petition-filed-to-stop-national-dialogue-committee-talks-at-bomas-n328347">talks</a> to assuage the opposition elite who had resorted to violent protests against his historic victory. These elitist self-serving talks could lead to constitutional amendments creating <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-11-10-dialogue-team-retreats-to-prepare-final-report/">more political positions</a> under a cynically flawed logic that this approach enhances national cohesion. This is an <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/counties/article/2001313447/ruto-lets-create-jobs-not-seats">about turn</a> on Ruto’s part.</p>
<p>Ultimately national cohesion is Ruto’s pressing challenge. Kenya is divided on many fronts – economic, ethnic, regional and religious – a legacy of previous governments. Ruto needs to look beyond ethno-regional appointments. For legitimacy and transformation, he needs to ideologically reconnect with and dignify the “hustler nation”, the disenfranchised constituency that propelled him into power. Bar this, he could face an intensely contested reelection bid like his predecessors.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/215171/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Westen K Shilaho does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Just over a year since he was sworn in, Ruto is no nearer to turning the Kenyan ship around.Westen K Shilaho, Senior Research Fellow, Institute for PanAfrican Thought and Conversation (IPATC), University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2172012023-11-10T09:18:21Z2023-11-10T09:18:21ZVisa-free travel for Africans: why Kenya and Rwanda have taken a step in the right direction<p>President William Ruto of Kenya recently <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-67254349">announced</a> that Kenya’s borders would be open to visitors from the entirety of Africa, with no visas required, by the end of 2023. He said</p>
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<p>When people cannot travel, business people cannot travel, entrepreneurs cannot travel, we all become net losers.</p>
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<p>A few days later, President Paul Kagame of Rwanda <a href="https://apnews.com/article/rwanda-visa-africans-actfa-africa-09edb93691babd5e0cebd2e131fd7ecb">followed suit</a>, saying all Africans would be able to enter Rwanda without visas.</p>
<p>Neither Kenya nor Rwanda will be the first. By the end of 2022, <a href="https://www.afdb.org/en/documents/africa-visa-openness-report-2022#page=38">Benin, The Gambia and Seychelles</a> had already implemented a system of visa-free access for all Africans. Perhaps more will follow soon. Some regions, some sub-regional groups and some bilateral arrangements have also resulted in visa-free access and even passport-free access in certain cases. </p>
<p>Within the broader East African Community, Uganda, Rwanda and Kenya <a href="https://immigration.go.ug/services/interstate-pass">allow</a> cross border travel without passports. Botswana and Namibia recently <a href="https://www.tralac.org/blog/article/15940-botswana-and-namibia-concluded-an-agreement-on-the-movement-of-persons.html">signed</a> a similar agreement. </p>
<p>Despite this progress, by the end of 2022 <a href="https://www.visaopenness.org/fileadmin/uploads/afdb/Documents/VOI%E2%80%932022_final2_9dec22.pdf#page=12">only 27%</a> of African routes allowed Africans to travel visa-free. </p>
<p>Actions such as those of Kenya and Rwanda take the African Union’s agenda further. Regularising freer movement of people across African borders is one of the continent’s great developmental challenges. It is one of the flagship projects of the African Union’s <a href="https://au.int/agenda2063/flagship-projects">Agenda 2063</a>. </p>
<p>But even if all African countries no longer required visas from Africans, this would not necessarily give the visitors a right to apply for jobs, establish a business or build a home in the receiving country. The 2018 African Union Free Movement of Persons protocol <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10220461.2021.2007788">aims</a> for full free movement, through three phases – entry, residence and establishment. This includes full economic rights, including employment. It has not been widely ratified, however. </p>
<p><a href="https://nsi.org.za/publications/analysis-trends-patterns-migration-africa/">Our new study of migration trends</a> underscores the potential contributions of migration to economic development in the countries of origin and destination. This is realised through the transfer of skills, knowledge and remittances. The study also shows that intra-African migration is firmly rooted in geographical, social and economic ties. Movement is predominantly within regions, and moderately between them.</p>
<h2>Free trade and movement of people</h2>
<p>African Union policies support freer intracontinental trade, investment and movement of people to promote the continent’s economic, social and political development. The continent has <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10220461.2021.2007788">made progress</a> on the aspects of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement that deal with trade and investment. There hasn’t been much progress on the free movement of people. And yet the success of the trade agreement requires freer movement of people.</p>
<p>This interdependence between trade and free movement of people was the focus of the recent <a href="https://au.int/en/pressreleases/20231031/8th-pan-african-forum-migration-pafom8-kicks">Pan-African Forum on Migration</a> held in Gaborone, the Botswana capital. The forum brings together African Union member states, the continent’s regional economic communities, UN agencies and intergovernmental organisations <a href="https://www.iom.int/pan-african-forum-migration-pafom">to deliberate on migration and human mobility issues</a> in Africa. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/free-movement-of-people-across-africa-regions-are-showing-how-it-can-work-197199">Free movement of people across Africa: regions are showing how it can work</a>
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<p>The conference noted that most African countries had failed to ratify the African Union’s <a href="https://au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/36403-treaty-protocol_on_free_movement_of_persons_in_africa_e.pdf">Free Movement of Persons protocol</a>. At the same time, there was evidence of improvements in policies and practices at national, bilateral and multilateral levels that facilitate the freer movement of Africans.</p>
<p>Apart from recent announcements by Rwanda and Kenya, other instances would be a growing number of <a href="https://theconversation.com/free-movement-of-people-across-africa-regions-are-showing-how-it-can-work-197199">reciprocal</a> arrangements between countries.</p>
<h2>Regional migration a norm</h2>
<p>The history of African statehood, with strong social ties across national boundaries, makes regional mobility a norm rather than an exception. This can be seen from the migration routes, mostly found within the same regions and which proceed in both directions. </p>
<p>For example, Burkina Faso to Côte d’Ivoire is the largest migrant route in the continent and within the Economic Community of West Africa (<a href="https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/africa/regional-economic-communities-rec/economic-community-west-african-states">Ecowas</a>) – the economic bloc of 15 west African states. Côte d’Ivoire to Burkina Faso is equally popular. This trend is ubiquitous throughout the continent, except within the <a href="https://www.sadc.int/">Southern African Development Community</a> region, where most migrant routes tend to lead to South Africa.</p>
<p>Among the major regional economic communities, Ecowas has the most intense regional migration. It is followed by the Southern African Development Community and the East African Community. By contrast, Ecowas has the least inter-regional migration while the East African Community has the most.</p>
<p>Variations in development across Africa mean that some countries experience contrasting patterns, particularly in extra-continental migration. While most African migrants migrate to and from other parts of the continent, in middle income countries such as South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria extra-continental emigration is greater.</p>
<p>Immigration and emigration are generally <a href="https://nsi.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/An-analysis-of-trends-and-patterns-of-migration-in-Africa.pdf#page=6">low in low income countries</a> and higher in middle income countries. In rich countries, people tend not to emigrate. The relatively low level of migration in Africa follows this pattern.</p>
<p>Only <a href="https://nsi.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/An-analysis-of-trends-and-patterns-of-migration-in-Africa.pdf#page=11">14% of total world emigrants</a> come from Africa. The average migrant density, or percentage of migrants living on the continent, is 1.89% compared to a global average of <a href="https://nsi.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/An-analysis-of-trends-and-patterns-of-migration-in-Africa.pdf#page=6">3.6%</a> where Europe and North America are at 12% and 16% respectively. African migration is thus not only comparatively low compared with the global averages, but characteristically depicts low income.</p>
<p>High income countries tend to have more immigrants than emigrants. The converse is true for low income regions. Africa as a whole has more emigrants than immigrants, confirming the link between migration and development. </p>
<h2>Legal restrictions matter little</h2>
<p>Much migration in Africa is impervious to legal constrictions or definitions of national boundaries, and even to logistical constraints. Government dictates succeed in making much of this migration irregular but fail to stop it. Though regional integration and liberalisation of migration rules are helpful, they do not yet solve this challenge.</p>
<p>The main migrant sending country to Kenya is Somalia, despite not being in the same regional economic community. And despite efforts by the government of Kenya to deter Somali migrants to Kenya. The main destination country for Nigerian emigrants in Africa is Cameroon, even though it does not belong to Ecowas.</p>
<p>While African migration governance reforms are making <a href="https://theconversation.com/free-movement-of-people-across-africa-regions-are-showing-how-it-can-work-197199">considerable progress</a> it will still be a while till they catch up and are able to deal fairly and rationally with the reality of migration patterns in Africa.</p>
<p><em>Michael Mutava of the New South Institute authored the report on which this article is based.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217201/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alan Hirsch is employed as a research fellow at the New South Institute where he supervised some of the research on which this article is based.</span></em></p>Regularising freer movement of people across African borders is one of the continent’s great developmental challenges.Alan Hirsch, Research Fellow New South Institute, Emeritus Professor at The Nelson Mandela School of Public Governance, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2165992023-10-30T16:14:06Z2023-10-30T16:14:06ZKing Charles in Kenya: despite past tensions, the visit is a sign of a strong relationship with Britain<p>King Charles’ <a href="https://www.royal.uk/Kenya-announcement">visit to Kenya this week</a> is the British monarch’s first to a <a href="https://thecommonwealth.org/about-us">Commonwealth nation</a> since his coronation in September 2022. The visit comes during the country’s 60th anniversary of <a href="https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/kenya-declares-independence-from-britain">independence from Britain</a>.</p>
<p>By choosing Kenya, the British government and monarchy seek to highlight the importance they attribute to the east African nation. It also shows other Commonwealth members that it’s possible for a republic to have a positive relationship with Britain. Some Commonwealth states like <a href="https://constitutionnet.org/news/jamaicas-transition-republic-process-matters">Jamaica</a> are contemplating removing the king as head of state.</p>
<p>King Charles’ visit is meant to celebrate <a href="https://www.royal.uk/Kenya-announcement">the warm relationship</a> between the two countries. It will also <a href="https://www.royal.uk/Kenya-announcement">acknowledge the more painful aspects</a> of the UK and Kenya’s shared history. </p>
<p>The relationship with Kenya remains one of Britain’s more positive post-colonial relationships. However, there have been <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/calls-for-king-charles-to-apologise-for-colonial-era-atrocities-on-kenya-visit-4398116">calls for Britain to apologise and make reparations</a> for its brutal suppression of freedom fighters. People in Kenya, Britain and other former colonies will be watching closely to see what the king has to say.</p>
<p>I’m a historian who has <a href="https://www.lboro.ac.uk/subjects/politics-international-studies/staff/poppy-cullen/#tab2">studied and written</a> about the political relationship between Britain and Kenya in the decades after independence. In my view, the relationship has taken a positive tilt since independence for three reasons. These are: the choices of Kenya’s first independent president; diplomatic, economic and ideological alignments; and military ties. </p>
<h2>Kenya and Britain’s history</h2>
<p>Kenya became a British colony in the late 19th century. A small minority of white British settlers held almost all of the <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-319-56276-6">political and economic power</a>. The British government planned to make Kenya a “multi-racial” state. The small white European and Asian populations of 55,700 and 176,600 people, respectively, would have equal or more power than the black majority of 8.3 million. Only in 1960 did the British government accept that Kenya should have majority rule and independence. </p>
<p>Independence celebrations in 1963 were preceded by a difficult period of negotiation and violence. A state of emergency was declared in 1952 in response to the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Mau-Mau">Mau Mau uprising</a>. This was an armed rebellion among one of Kenya’s major tribes, the Kikuyu, fighting for land and freedom. </p>
<p>The emergency lasted until 1960. Over this period, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/aug/18/uncovering-truth-british-empire-caroline-elkins-mau-mau">thousands of Kenyans were killed</a>, and tens of thousands were detained in camps without trial. The camps became sites of violence and abuse. </p>
<p>With this past, a close post-colonial relationship between Kenya and Britain can appear surprising. It was expected that Kenya would turn away from Britain and towards other international partners, such as the US or the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/Soviet-Union">Soviet Union</a>. </p>
<p>Instead, the relationship has largely been close and friendly, with trade benefits, alignment on significant issues and strong military ties.</p>
<h2>Positive relations</h2>
<p>Kenya’s first president, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jomo-Kenyatta/Return-to-Kenya">Jomo Kenyatta</a>, had been imprisoned by Britain as a leader of the Mau Mau. But once he took leadership, he opted to work primarily with Britain. </p>
<p>Kenyatta saw the benefits he could get from this relationship. These included financial and military backing during the Cold War, and personal backing. In 1965, Britain made plans to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/07075332.2016.1261917">protect</a> Kenyatta if a coup was attempted.</p>
<p>British officials were surprised but pleased by Kenyatta’s position. They had many interests in Kenya, ranging from trade to diplomacy. One key interest was Kenya’s white European and Asian populations who held British passports. To help achieve their security, the British government financed the purchase of their land, which could then be sold to Kenyans. Before independence, many in Kenya had hoped for land redistribution. Instead, European settlers got financial benefits.</p>
<p>For decades after independence, Britain was Kenya’s primary economic partner. Currently, Britain is the <a href="https://www.kenyahighcom.org.uk/kenya-uk-relations">largest European investor in Kenya and Kenya’s second-largest export destination</a>. There are <a href="https://www.britishchambers.org.uk/locations/british-chamber-of-commerce-kenya/#:%7E:text=As%20it%20stands%2C%20there%20are,139%20billion%20in%20value.">more than 200</a> British businesses operating in Kenya. </p>
<p>The British and Kenyan governments have <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-kenya-strategic-partnership-2020-2025">broadly aligned on international diplomatic issues</a> like the Cold War, and later the “war on terror”. There were some exceptions, and the Kenyan government did criticise British policies towards white rule in Rhodesia and apartheid in South Africa. But in private the relationship remained cordial. </p>
<h2>Military connections</h2>
<p>Military ties have been especially close. Britain remains a training partner. The royal visit includes <a href="https://www.royal.uk/Kenya-announcement">meeting Kenyan marines trained by British marines</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/07075332.2016.1261917">Britain has also sold arms to Kenya</a> and provided support to set up a navy and air force after independence. </p>
<p>After independence, many African countries expelled their British military commanders to replace them with Africans. Kenya under Jomo Kenyatta chose to keep British commanders. The Kenyan army was led by a British officer until 1966, the navy until 1972 and the air force until 1973. </p>
<p>Most important for Britain is that its military is allowed to <a href="https://www.army.mod.uk/deployments/africa/">train in Kenya</a>. This allows them to practise in different and difficult terrains.</p>
<h2>Closeness despite challenges</h2>
<p>The relationship between the two nations since independence has not always been smooth, however. </p>
<p>In 1967-68, Kenya increased policies that <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/february/4/newsid_2738000/2738629.stm">discriminated against Kenyan Asians</a>. The 1967 Immigration Act and 1968 Trade Licensing Act, for instance, meant non-citizens (including many Asians) needed work permits. This led to the immigration to Britain of <a href="https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/1968-02-15/debates/e5e33ebe-b72f-4bae-82b4-1125bab0f265/AsianImmigrantsFromKenya">13,600 east African Asians</a> in 1967.</p>
<p>The British government then <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1968/9/pdfs/ukpga_19680009_en.pdf#page=4">passed legislation</a> to limit their right to enter the UK despite their holding British passports. </p>
<p>After Ugandan president Idi Amin <a href="https://lordslibrary.parliament.uk/ugandan-asians-50-years-since-their-expulsion-from-uganda/">expelled the Asian population</a> in 1972 – about 40,000 Asian Ugandans moved to the UK – Britain offered aid to Kenya to ensure it didn’t follow a similar policy. </p>
<p>In 1982, after the Kenya Air Force <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1982/08/09/how-kenyas-rebels-botched-their-coup/ca1fdf2f-3961-476f-a682-45be109e583f/">attempted a coup</a>, many in Kenya’s elite became suspicious of Britain’s aims in the country. </p>
<p>Since independence, some in Kenya have <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/calls-for-king-charles-to-apologise-for-colonial-era-atrocities-on-kenya-visit-4398116">questioned</a> why British troops still train in the country. The killing in 2012 of a Kenyan woman, <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10931549/British-soldier-accused-fatally-stabbing-Kenyan-prostitute-Agnes-Wanjiru-21-England.html">Agnes Wanjiru</a>, seemingly by British soldiers, exacerbated these grumblings.</p>
<p>The issue of the Mau Mau has also been a source of recent tension. </p>
<p>Kenya has repeatedly asked for archive files related to the Mau Mau, which the British government denied having. These files were only <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a824499e5274a2e87dc2089/cary-report-release-colonial-administration-files.pdf">acknowledged and released after 2011</a>. </p>
<p>In 2013, the British government finally acknowledged that the government had known about and been complicit in torture and violence during the emergency, and victims would be paid compensation of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/06/uk-compensate-kenya-mau-mau-torture">£19.9 million</a>. The then foreign secretary William Hague <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/statement-to-parliament-on-settlement-of-mau-mau-claims">stated</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The British government sincerely regrets that these abuses took place. </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Pushing forward</h2>
<p>Despite moments of tension, the two governments have always sought to dispel difficulties. The king’s visit, for instance, is on the invitation of Kenya’s president William Ruto. Ruto made his first overseas visit as president to the UK for <a href="https://www.pd.co.ke/news/ruto-attention-british-monarchs-funeral-150476/">Queen Elizabeth’s funeral</a> in September 2022. </p>
<p>Over six decades, the challenges that have arisen have not been enough to derail the relationship.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216599/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Poppy Cullen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The visit will acknowledge the more painful aspects of the UK and Kenya’s colonial history.Poppy Cullen, Lecturer in International History, Loughborough UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2127102023-09-13T13:09:11Z2023-09-13T13:09:11ZKenyans don’t trust the courts - the main factors behind this trend<p>The international reputation of the Kenyan judiciary is <a href="https://verfassungsblog.de/the-bbi-judgment-and-the-invention-of-kenya/">running high</a> following a raft of judicial reforms brought on by the 2010 constitution. The reforms, displays of judicial independence, and largely positive personal experiences might lead one to expect that public trust in the courts has increased. But among the Kenyan public it has not.</p>
<p>High-profile Supreme Court judgments have showcased a newfound judicial independence. The most notable include the <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/kenya-supreme-court-nullifies-uhuru-kenya-s-re-election-orders-fresh-vote-1372638">nullification</a> of a presidential result in 2017, the rejection of government efforts to force through <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/kenya-s-supreme-court-declares-bbi-unconstitutional-3766868">constitutional changes</a> in 2021 and <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/national/article/2001467772/supreme-court-gays-and-lesbians-have-a-right-of-association">confirmation</a> in 2023 of the rights of LGBTIQ+ people to form associations. </p>
<p>Personal experience of the courts is also largely positive. In March 2023 I commissioned Trends and Insights For Africa, a market research company based in Nairobi, to add questions on the Kenyan judiciary to a nationally representative face-to-face <a href="https://www.tifaresearch.com/azimio-protests-other-opposition-issues-2023-national-survey-post-post-election-issues/">survey</a>. </p>
<p>It revealed that 18.7% of respondents reported having been involved in a case in a Kenyan court room. Of these, 43.4% rated the experience as very positive, 25.1% as quite positive. Neutral responses made up 11.9%; 6.3% were quite negative; and 11.9% were very negative. Of the overall sample, 12.8% had a positive personal experience of the courts, and only 3.4% a negative one.</p>
<p>Public perceptions of the Kenyan judiciary have been tracked for nearly 20 years. According to 2021 data from the independent research network Afrobarometer, 16.9% of Kenyans had <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/survey-resource/kenya-round-9-data-2023/">no trust</a> in this key institution, up from 11.4% in <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/survey-resource/kenya-round-2-data-2003/">2003</a>. The only time that public trust was clearly lower was in 2008. This followed the 2007 election and post-election crisis, which drew attention to a <a href="https://journals.co.za/doi/abs/10.10520/EJC10308">perceived lack of judicial independence</a>.</p>
<p>More worryingly still, a majority of respondents in my March 2023 poll thought that Supreme Court judges were very often or sometimes bribed (58.1%) or intimidated (59.4%) to give a verdict unsupported by the evidence. There was hardly any distinction between public perceptions of the Supreme Court, High Court and magistrates.</p>
<p>This confidence crisis is a problem because people need to believe the judiciary is acting independently if it is to play its role. For example, the fact that the Kenyan opposition <a href="https://www.knchr.org/Portals/0/Reports/Waki_Report.pdf">did not trust the courts</a> in 2007 led them to protest about the election on the streets, rather than bring a petition. It sparked the country’s worst crisis. </p>
<p>I am a <a href="https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/pais/people/lynch/">political scientist</a> who has studied Kenya for 20 years. My current research focuses on the critical role of the judiciary, which is relatively understudied. </p>
<h2>What shapes perceptions</h2>
<p>It’s important to try to understand the confidence crisis.</p>
<p>Despite reforms there are still regular reports of judicial bias and <a href="https://www.pd.co.ke/news/chief-justice-koome-cites-corruption-in-case-backlog-110117/">corruption</a>. There are also interactions that <a href="https://www.pulselive.co.ke/news/local/ahmednasir-criticises-how-martha-koome-received-president-ruto-in-parliament/6dtt40t">suggest</a> a “cosy relationship” between the judiciary and the political elite. This casts a shadow over the whole judiciary. </p>
<p>Public perception reports must also be considered in context. The year 2003 was a time of great optimism in Kenya. It followed the landslide victory of Mwai Kibaki over the party that had ruled the country since independence. Kenyans were the <a href="http://www.gilanifoundation.com/homepage/eoy/2002_EoY02comment.pdf">most optimistic citizens in the world</a> at the end of 2002. Public confidence in other key institutions – including the president, parliament, electoral commission, police, and army – was higher in 2003 than any subsequent round of the <a href="https://www.afrobarometer.org/countries/kenya/">Afrobarometer</a>. </p>
<p>Optimism soon turned to pessimism and finally <a href="https://www.knchr.org/Portals/0/Reports/Waki_Report.pdf">deadly violence</a> following the disputed election of 2007. A new constitution in 2010 <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-11103008">failed to provide “quick fixes”</a>. Governance and socio-economic problems persist. </p>
<p>Scholars and the international observers have high regard for the Supreme Court’s 2017 presidential petition ruling and subsequent bold decisions. But public opinion in Kenya is divided. My March 2023 poll asked people whether there was a Supreme Court case that they disagreed with. Ordinary citizens cited exactly those cases that have been internationally lauded: 47.4% referred to the gay rights of association case (freshly concluded in February 2023); 21.2% cited the 2022 presidential petition, 8.6% the 2017 petition, and 5% the 2013 petition. </p>
<p>People’s views on these cases differ depending on their own views and interests, the opinion leaders they listen to, and their expectations of how a court should behave. For example, of the 26.3% of respondents who said they were dissatisfied with the way the Supreme Court handled the 2022 presidential petition, 43.8% said one of the reasons was that the decision was not based on evidence or was biased; 11.3% cited outside interference or coercion and 32.8% bribery. And 18.2% said that they were annoyed because the court didn’t nullify the election. </p>
<p>However, 24% said that they were dissatisfied because the court was rushed or had insufficient time and 10% because the ruling used rude or dismissive language. Those who cited time issues or language as one of the reasons for their dissatisfaction were a minority but they remind us of how public perceptions are informed not only by the substance of rulings, but by how judges behave.</p>
<p>It also means that acts that have attracted public criticism – such as the chief justice and deputy chief justice <a href="https://www.pulselive.co.ke/news/local/ahmednasir-criticises-how-martha-koome-received-president-ruto-in-parliament/6dtt40t">lining up alongside politicians</a> to welcome President William Ruto to the opening of parliament in September 2022 – have helped to reinforce popular perceptions of a judiciary that is biased or liable to being bribed or intimidated. </p>
<h2>The role of the media</h2>
<p>High profile and highly divisive cases, such as presidential petitions, receive much traditional media coverage of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK0GTl4WbI8">proceedings</a> and associated <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/azimio-responds-to-supreme-courts-full-judgment-on-presidential-election-petition-n306468">allegations of injustice</a>. This coverage places the Supreme Court in an almost impossible situation, earning the public ire of either the opposition (for example, the 2022 petition) or the government (for example, the 2023 gay rights association case). </p>
<p>At the same time, an increasing number of Kenyans gain their political news from social media either <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14662043.2023.2232160?src=&fbclid=IwAR2l_o889e75LO1rc3gM33RufPbpn69mFglO0yQvKdOdhdWgjd1C-zKbyrA">directly or indirectly</a> by sharing online stories offline. Traditional media are relatively careful about what they say about ongoing cases or judges – lest they be held in contempt of court or be sued for libel. Discussions on social media are not as regulated. It has become commonplace for opinion leaders of different political persuasions to <a href="https://twitter.com/makaumutua/status/1569342163573415936">publicly attack</a> the judiciary. </p>
<p>The allegations range from those likely to have some basis to misinformation. Views in 2023 are likely coloured by the failure of reforms to bring significant socio-economic change, and by a cost-of-living crisis. In this situation, negative information is more likely to resonate. </p>
<p>This interplay of factors helps to explain why public trust in the courts is lower than in 2003 after years of reform and investment, improved judicial independence and largely positive personal experiences.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212710/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gabrielle Lynch received funding from the University of Warwick Policy Support Fund. </span></em></p>Kenya’s confidence crisis is a problem because people need to believe the judiciary is acting independently if it is to play its role.Gabrielle Lynch, Professor of Comparative Politics, University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2111292023-08-08T15:09:37Z2023-08-08T15:09:37ZKenya’s political dialogue is a welcome sign of democracy at work – if both sides understand their roles<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541515/original/file-20230807-26-bhua21.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Raila Odinga, the leader of the Azimio la Umoja coalition in Kenya.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Simon Maina/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since Kenya’s presidential <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/15/william-ruto-declared-winner-of-kenya-presidential-election-amid-dispute">election in August 2022</a>, the new government has been <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-62631193#:%7E:text=Argues%20that%20he%20did%20not,questions%20about%20the%20tallying%20process">in conflict</a> with the opposition. </p>
<p>In democratic systems, such conflict is healthy; it can enhance governance. But it <a href="https://www.africanews.com/2023/07/20/kenyas-violent-protests-sabotaging-economy-president-ruto-says/">must not interfere with</a> the government’s ability to perform its constitutional functions.</p>
<p>In Kenya, the friction between the government and opposition led to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2023/jul/21/death-toll-rises-as-kenyas-cost-of-living-protests-continue">mass protests</a> in March 2023. The <a href="https://www.rfi.fr/en/africa/20230320-kenyan-opposition-leader-raila-odinga-calls-for-weekly-rallies-over-cost-of-living-crisis">opposition</a> organised them <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2023/07/20/africa/kenya-cost-of-living-protests-explainer-intl/index.html#:%7E:text=A%20wave%20of%20deadly%20protests,businesses%20attacked%20and%20schools%20closed.">around</a> rising taxes and the high cost of living. </p>
<p>If carried out peacefully, political protests can <a href="https://news.northeastern.edu/2020/06/10/are-peaceful-protests-more-effective-than-violent-ones/">deepen democracy</a>. Kenya’s have often <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/gallery/2023/7/13/deadly-anti-government-protests-roil-kenya">deteriorated into violence</a>, however. <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/police-have-killed-30-protesters-since-march-2023-amnesty-international-4309868">Heavy-handed government interventions</a> have then created even more violence. This threatens the sustainability of the country’s democratic institutions. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/mass-protests-in-kenya-have-a-long-and-rich-history-but-have-been-hijacked-by-the-elites-202979">Mass protests in Kenya have a long and rich history – but have been hijacked by the elites</a>
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</p>
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<p>The opposition recently <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/7/29/kenya-government-and-opposition-agree-to-talks-after-protests">called off street protests</a> to engage the government in dialogue. I have <a href="https://www.weber.edu/goddard/John_Mbaku.html">studied democratisation and political economy in Africa</a> for more than two decades, and in my view, these talks are an opportunity to strengthen Kenya’s democratic systems.</p>
<p>Both the government and the opposition have a duty to work towards creating a Kenya in which all citizens can live peacefully, by the values that are important to them, and elect who they want.</p>
<p>But for this to happen, each party to the talks must understand its constitutional role. It must play its part constructively and within the law. The opposition should be a check on the exercise of government power, but it must not obstruct governance. The opposition should evaluate public policy and offer alternatives, but allow the government to formulate the national agenda. </p>
<p>On the other hand, the government must recognise the important role the opposition plays in a democratic system. An effective opposition provides the government with feedback that advances national objectives. It contributes positively to peaceful coexistence, the protection of human rights and national development.</p>
<h2>The importance of the talks</h2>
<p>The opposition suspended its call for mass protests in July 2023 to engage in <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/kalonzo-lead-azimio-team-in-talks-with-kenya-kwanza-4322554">dialogue</a> with the government. The talks will be facilitated by former Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo. Opposition leader Raila Odinga wants the talks concluded in <a href="https://www.pd.co.ke/inside-politics/raila-issues-demands-to-ruto-194622/">just over seven weeks</a>.</p>
<p>Odinga’s team of five has tabled <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-08-03-azimio-invites-ruto-team-for-first-meeting-lists-5-issues-to-be-discussed/">five issues</a>. It wants the government to:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>address the cost of living</p></li>
<li><p>reconstitute the elections agency</p></li>
<li><p>audit the 2022 poll</p></li>
<li><p>prevent state interference with political parties</p></li>
<li><p>resolve outstanding constitutional issues. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>The government also brings a <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-08-07-ruto-sets-tone-for-kenya-kwanza-azimio-dialogue-at-bomas/">five-member team</a>. Its list includes establishing the offices of the leader of opposition and prime cabinet secretary, as well as implementing <a href="https://www.klrc.go.ke/index.php/constitution-of-kenya/112-chapter-four-the-bill-of-rights/part-2-rights-and-fundamental-freedoms/193-27-equality-and-freedom-from-discrimination#:%7E:text=(8)%20In%20addition%20to%20the,be%20of%20the%20same%20gender.">gender diversity laws</a>. President William Ruto has said he has <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-08-07-ruto-sets-tone-for-kenya-kwanza-azimio-dialogue-at-bomas/">no interest</a> in reopening debate on the results of the 2022 election. </p>
<p>These talks are a welcome sign of Kenya’s democracy maturing. But as the ruling party, Kenya Kwanza, <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/kalonzo-lead-azimio-team-in-talks-with-kenya-kwanza-4322554">has reminded</a> the opposition coalition, Azimio la Umoja, that the opposition’s job is to analyse government policies and offer alternatives. It is not to force its economic and political agenda on the government.</p>
<p>Regardless of what is <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/kalonzo-lead-azimio-team-in-talks-with-kenya-kwanza-4322554">on the table for discussion</a>, the dialogue should enhance governance and promote national development. </p>
<p>Parties to the talks should:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>consider ways to enhance government efficiency, accountability and productivity </p></li>
<li><p>concentrate on creating jobs, fighting inflation and helping Kenyans deal with climate change and other development challenges </p></li>
<li><p>help Kenya strengthen its democratic institutions, and promote their growth and maturity </p></li>
<li><p>provide an institutional environment within which all Kenyans, regardless of their ethnic affiliation, can live together peacefully. </p></li>
</ul>
<h2>Understanding the roles</h2>
<p>In emerging democracies, such as Kenya’s, a key source of conflict is the failure or inability of the government, the opposition and their supporters to understand and appreciate the roles that the constitution gives them. </p>
<p>In a functioning democratic system, the opposition is part of the governance architecture. It makes sure that the government is open, transparent and accountable to both the people and the constitution. However, it must not <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/7/18/kenya-braces-for-3-days-of-anti-govt-protest-all-the-details">frustrate</a> or interfere with government. </p>
<p>The government must consult and interact peacefully with all stakeholders, not just its supporters. This is critical in a country like Kenya which has a <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-politicians-continue-to-use-ethnicity-to-divide-and-rule-60-years-after-independence-207930">significant diversity</a> of people, cultures, values, languages and economic and social aspirations.</p>
<p>A misunderstanding of roles could paralyse the government and make it non-functional. </p>
<h2>Way forward</h2>
<p>The present dialogue’s function must be:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>to strengthen the government, not cripple it</p></li>
<li><p>to advance the interests of all Kenyans, not just of specific politicians or ethnic groups</p></li>
<li><p>to improve the rule of law, not to open up political spaces for the benefit of opposition leaders</p></li>
<li><p>to build the country’s democracy, not to tear it down </p></li>
<li><p>to unite Kenyans, not to divide them</p></li>
<li><p>to ensure the advancement of a peaceful and productive Kenya.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>Kenya’s national leaders – both in government and opposition – must build a political system in the country that advances inclusive development.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211129/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Mukum Mbaku does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The government and opposition have a duty to work towards creating a Kenya in which all citizens can live peacefully.John Mukum Mbaku, Professor, Weber State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2082732023-08-02T18:07:16Z2023-08-02T18:07:16ZCould Trump turn his politics of grievance into a get-out-of-jail card? Neither prosecution nor even jail time has prevented former leaders in Israel, Brazil and Kenya from mounting comebacks<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540488/original/file-20230801-15-hfb8gb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3876%2C2831&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Donald Trump enters a political rally while campaigning for the GOP 2024 nomination on July 29, 2023, in Erie, Pa.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/former-u-s-president-donald-trump-enters-erie-insurance-news-photo/1563680624?adppopup=true">Jeff Swensen/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Donald Trump has declared, “<a href="https://www.c-span.org/video/?c5060238/pres-trump-i-justicei-retribution">I am your retribution</a>,” and it appears to be a guiding theme of his 2024 campaign. </p>
<p>He now <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/08/01/us/trump-indictment-jan-6">faces a total of three indictments</a>, following Special Counsel Jack Smith’s announcement on Aug. 1, 2023 that Trump had been charged with four counts in his effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election – the most serious charges so far. There’s likely to be an additional indictment from Fulton County, Georgia, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/07/31/georgia-2020-election-investigation-trump/">prosecutor Fani Willis</a>. </p>
<p>If elected, he promises to <a href="https://apnews.com/article/trump-retribution-indictment-documents-biden-american-democracy-5a8ec37b359fee85d0f0956139d79f51">punish his perceived enemies</a> – everyone from prosecutors at the Justice Department and in New York and Georgia to the Biden family and Republicans in Congress who don’t <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/29/us/politics/trump-pennsylvania-rally.html">help him</a>. </p>
<p>Trump and his allies are ramping up their <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-allies-in-congress-leap-to-defend-former-president-after-federal-indictment">rhetoric</a>, playing the victim card with cries of “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-vpdWQFcyo">witch hunt</a>” and making promises to <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/trump-vows-appoint-prosecutor-target-171530172.html">use the machinery of government</a> to punish anyone who has attempted to hold Trump accountable. </p>
<p>While appeals to grievance have been used in presidential campaigns, <a href="https://www.axios.com/2023/06/09/trump-president-run-criminal-charges-indictment">never before in American history</a> has a leading contender for a major party’s nomination made their personal grievances related to criminal liability and payback the centerpiece of their presidential run. </p>
<p>Is a campaign based on grievance and retribution likely to sway voters? And what are the implications if Trump wins back the White House? </p>
<p>As scholars who study <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/politics-international-relations/political-economy/authoritarianism-and-elite-origins-democracy">democracy</a>, <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/politics-international-relations/american-government-politics-and-policy/social-origins-electoral-participation-emerging-democracies">voting behavior</a> and political corruption globally, we note that while the politicization of prosecutions is becoming <a href="https://theconversation.com/prosecuting-a-president-is-divisive-and-sometimes-destabilizing-heres-why-many-countries-do-it-anyway-188565?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=twitterbutton">increasingly common</a> in other democracies, it can be hard to figure out how these dynamics affect elections. </p>
<h2>Political muscle can trounce a prosecution</h2>
<p>Candidates under investigation can leverage their political muscle to run for office – and as a means to avoid prosecution. </p>
<p>In <a href="https://academic.oup.com/edited-volume/28167/chapter-abstract/213005469?redirectedFrom=fulltext">Kenya’s 2007 presidential election</a>, Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto were two prominent politicians backing opposing coalitions that engaged in post-election clashes after allegations of vote rigging. </p>
<p>Members of both factions were investigated, and Kenyatta and Ruto were personally charged with organizing the violence among their supporters. Their cases were <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-16675268">referred to the International Criminal Court</a>, or ICC, after the Kenyan government slow-rolled local prosecutions. </p>
<p>But as the cases dragged on, these erstwhile enemies forged an electoral alliance to win the 2013 contest. Kenyatta ran as president and Ruto his deputy, by – ironically – pushing a “<a href="https://academic.oup.com/edited-volume/28167/chapter-abstract/213006037?redirectedFrom=fulltext">peace narrative</a>” during the campaign. </p>
<p>This flexing of political muscle, a crusade questioning the ICC’s legitimacy and grassroots mobilization led to their eventual victory. That essentially ended their legal woes internationally and domestically. The <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-30347019">ICC dropped</a> <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-35965760">charges</a>, and they were reelected in 2017. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540492/original/file-20230801-27-oxqrx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A large crowd holding a sign in Hebrew and English that shows a fist and says 'We've just started.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540492/original/file-20230801-27-oxqrx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540492/original/file-20230801-27-oxqrx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540492/original/file-20230801-27-oxqrx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540492/original/file-20230801-27-oxqrx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540492/original/file-20230801-27-oxqrx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540492/original/file-20230801-27-oxqrx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540492/original/file-20230801-27-oxqrx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Israelis protest moves by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government to limit the power of the country’s Supreme Court.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-aerial-view-of-kaplan-street-as-israelis-gather-to-news-photo/1563351079?adppopup=true">Yair Palti/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Undermining accountability</h2>
<p>Should Trump win, he can appoint an attorney general who will follow his bidding and suspend prosecutions brought by the special counsel, or he can simply pardon himself of federal charges. </p>
<p>He can further seek to avoid trial or imprisonment by invoking a <a href="https://www.justice.gov/olc/opinion/sitting-president%E2%80%99s-amenability-indictment-and-criminal-prosecution">Department of Justice rule</a> that presidents cannot be under federal criminal indictment or in jail while they serve in office, although a candidate can <a href="https://theconversation.com/no-an-indictment-wouldnt-end-trumps-run-for-the-presidency-he-could-even-campaign-or-serve-from-a-jail-cell-194425">run for president and be elected under indictment or from jail</a>. A novel legal strategy for Trump would be to try to apply this also to state jurisdictions like New York and Georgia.</p>
<p>Any attempt to challenge the constitutionality of such actions – pardoning himself, dismissing the special counsel, ending state and local indictments – would no doubt end up at the Supreme Court. The court majority is conservative, suggesting it might rule in Trump’s favor. Additionally, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-5-john-mulaney/id1548294013?i=1000621655751">precedent and legal scholarship</a> also suggest that the court would deem at least some of these actions constitutional. </p>
<p>Beyond ending immediate prosecutions, victorious candidates can use winning office to further erode democratic institutions and the rule of law. </p>
<p>Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel has served as prime minister <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/03/world/middleeast/netanyahu-corruption-charges-israel.html">during his own corruption trials</a>. After losing office in 2021, he came to power again in 2022 while under indictment. </p>
<p>Netanyahu and his allies in parliament have pursued legislation to <a href="https://www.npr.org/2023/07/24/1189720508/israel-politics-netanyahu-judiciary">weaken the independence</a> of the Supreme Court, a portion of which was <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-contentious-judicial-reform-becomes-law-in-israel-netanyahu-cements-his-political-legacy-210043">recently passed by the legislature</a>. He and his allies have promised to go after the former attorneys general and other prosecutors overseeing Netanyahu’s <a href="https://apnews.com/article/israel-netanyahu-corruption-trial-courts-4e18ed8f34e65707bd47e37696da4705">criminal cases</a>. The attempts to diminish the Supreme Court’s power have resulted in months of anti-government protests. </p>
<p>Trump and his campaign view a 2024 win as an opportunity to significantly <a href="https://www.axios.com/2022/07/22/trump-2025-radical-plan-second-term">increase the power of the executive branch</a> to go after a “deep state” that has investigated Trump and his allies. That potentially undermines the independence and functioning of everything from the State and Justice departments to local law enforcement.</p>
<h2>Comebacks follow prosecutions</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540498/original/file-20230801-25-6joorn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man standing, gripping a metal rail with one hand, the other hand raised with a fist, in the nighttime." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540498/original/file-20230801-25-6joorn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/540498/original/file-20230801-25-6joorn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540498/original/file-20230801-25-6joorn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540498/original/file-20230801-25-6joorn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540498/original/file-20230801-25-6joorn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540498/original/file-20230801-25-6joorn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/540498/original/file-20230801-25-6joorn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former Brazilian president Lula Inácio da Silva was elected once again in 2022 after his conviction and imprisonment.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/brazilian-president-elect-for-the-leftist-workers-party-news-photo/1244370111?adppopup=true">Caio Guatelli / AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Examples from other countries show that prosecution or even jail time does not prevent former leaders from mounting comebacks.</p>
<p>Former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was elected once again in 2022 <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/05/23/how-one-companys-deep-web-corruption-took-down-governments-across-latin-america/?itid=lk_inline_manual_54">after his conviction and imprisonment</a>. He argued that a <a href="https://theintercept.com/2019/06/09/brazil-lula-operation-car-wash-sergio-moro/">judge who was in cahoots with prosecutors</a>, and who became Lula’s predecessor’s <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/brazils-chief-justice-authorizes-investigation-into-bolsonaro/2020/04/27/54d95f52-88f6-11ea-80df-d24b35a568ae_story.html?itid=lk_inline_manual_54">justice minister</a>, revealed the politicized nature of Brazil’s justice system. That allowed him to play the victim card successfully at the ballot box.</p>
<p>Trump is innocent until proved guilty. His hard-core “Make America Great Again” supporters <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/31/upshot/poll-trump-republican-primary.html">tell pollsters</a> they believe in his complete innocence. We expect this is not likely to change, regardless of evidence prosecutors show to a jury and what those juries decide. </p>
<p>But if the facts of the cases and evidence presented at trial appear to moderates and independents as nothing burgers, or if swing voters otherwise feel the judicial process has unfairly targeted Trump with prosecutorial overreach, that could conceivably turn Trump’s <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/favorability/donald-trump/">persistent unfavorable ratings</a> into electoral victory.</p>
<p>Recent polling makes clear that while Trump has consolidated support for the Republican nomination among the MAGA crowd, <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/favorability/donald-trump/">nearly half of Republicans surveyed</a> are still considering other options. </p>
<p>In any event, his platform of victimization and retribution shows no signs of abating. Whether enough Republicans will turn out to vote and moderates swing toward Trump, and whether enough Democrats decide to stay home, suggest that this is still a very high-risk strategy for Trump, but if successful, likely to reward him with time away from jail.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208273/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Donald Trump has made personal grievances and payback the centerpiece of his presidential run. Will this strategy work? Two experts who study democracy look at others who have used these tactics.James D. Long, Professor of Political Science, Co-founder of the Political Economy Forum, University of WashingtonVictor Menaldo, Professor of Political Science, Co-founder of the Political Economy Forum, University of WashingtonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2099812023-07-22T08:22:52Z2023-07-22T08:22:52ZKenya’s logging ban has been lifted – it’s a political decision and a likely setback for conservation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/538145/original/file-20230718-25-ewgu2f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A scout from Kenya's forest protection unit walks past mangrove tree stumps in Malindi.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Simon Maina/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Kenyan president William Ruto has <a href="https://www.semafor.com/article/07/06/2023/lifting-kenya-logging-ban">lifted a six-year ban on logging</a>, despite <a href="https://www.vuma.earth/petitions/hands-off-our-forests-don-t-lift-the-ban-on-logging-public-community-forests-in-kenya">public objections</a>. Ruto said it would create jobs and boost economic growth. Lisa E. Fuchs has <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781847013477/a-political-ecology-of-kenyas-mau-forest/">studied the Mau Forest Complex</a>, one of Kenya’s most important – and most threatened – forests. She unpacks the implications of this decision.</em></p>
<h2>Why is the lifting of Kenya’s logging ban controversial?</h2>
<p>A logging ban is a political instrument. Its effectiveness depends mainly on two things. First, who is included and who is not, and why and how these actors will be supported to re-orient themselves sustainably. Second, the political will to implement it according to its intention. </p>
<p>The same applies for lifting a logging ban. But it’s important to keep in mind that controversial political announcements and decisions target different audiences. </p>
<p>Kenya’s latest logging ban was <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/government-bans-logging-191860">introduced in 2018</a>. This government directive was informed by shrinking water resources and came amid discussions to save Kenya’s water towers. </p>
<p>Deforestation in Kenya rose steeply from the early 1990s. According to estimates from the United Nations Environment Programme, the deforestation rate in Kenya was <a href="https://wedocs.unep.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.11822/8513/Montane_Forests_Kenya.pdf#page=10">5,000 hectares per year by 2010</a>. This had several effects, including changes in biodiversity, river flows and the microclimate. They had an impact on agricultural production, hydropower generation and inland fish production. Human health and well-being were also affected.</p>
<p>Environmentalists have argued that lifting this latest ban risks reversing the gains made in recent years to improve Kenya’s tree cover. The country surpassed its <a href="https://www.kenyanews.go.ke/kenya-surpasses-10-tree-cover-assessment-report-2021-says/">10% minimum tree cover target in June 2022</a>. It now plans to raise tree cover to <a href="https://www.kenyanews.go.ke/kfs-begins-1-5-billion-tree-project/">30% by 2032</a> by planting 15 billion trees. </p>
<p>Trees and forests <a href="https://www.fao.org/ecosystem-services-biodiversity/background/regulating-services/en/">provide ecosystem services</a> like air, climate and water regulation. These influence landscapes, livelihoods, economies and entire food systems.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-politics-has-subverted-conservation-efforts-to-protect-kenyas-mau-forest-187473">How politics has subverted conservation efforts to protect Kenya’s Mau Forest</a>
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<p>I have <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781847013477/a-political-ecology-of-kenyas-mau-forest/">studied Kenya’s failure</a> to “Save the Mau”. This was the tagline of <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/kenya/kenya-launches-multimillion-dollar-appeal-restore-vital-mau-forest">a large-scale campaign</a> to rehabilitate the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-politics-has-subverted-conservation-efforts-to-protect-kenyas-mau-forest-187473">Mau Forest Complex</a> in 2009. It involved multiple stakeholders, led by government and supported by civil society.</p>
<p>The Kenyan state has <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781847013477/a-political-ecology-of-kenyas-mau-forest/">historically</a> viewed and dealt with forests in terms of production and economic development, rather than biodiversity and conservation. Ruto, as minister for agriculture (2008-2010) and as deputy president (2013-2022), has <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/mps-demand-land-for-evicted-mau-squatters-614656">repeatedly defended this stance</a>. </p>
<h2>How have previous logging bans in Kenya played out?</h2>
<p>A similar ban – or rather, a three-month moratorium that was never officially lifted – existed between <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342136715_Logging_Ban_in_Kenya_Convergence_or_Divergence_from_the_Forest_Law_and_Policy_and_Impacts_on_Plantation_ForestryLogging_Ban_in_Kenya_Convergence_or_Divergence_from_the_Forest_Law_and_Policy_and_Impact">1999 and 2011</a>. In 1999, <a href="https://wedocs.unep.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.11822/28379/MauForest.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y#page=4">the country’s forests were in a bleak state</a>. “Post box sawmillers” – companies that existed on paper but not in practice – were held responsible for much of the disaster, alongside the Forestry Department, which was in charge of registering and licensing them. </p>
<p>The moratorium nullified these sawmillers’ licences. It restricted them from legal logging, denying them access to public forests. What many people don’t know is that this <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342136715_Logging_Ban_in_Kenya_Convergence_or_Divergence_from_the_Forest_Law_and_Policy_and_Impacts_on_Plantation_ForestryLogging_Ban_in_Kenya_Convergence_or_Divergence_from_the_Forest_Law_and_Policy_and_Impact">ban was only partial</a>. Kenya’s big timber producing companies (Timsales, Raiply, Comply and, intermittently, Pan-African Paper Mills) continued harvesting, processing and selling wood, timber and non-timber forest products without restriction. </p>
<p>These <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781847013477/a-political-ecology-of-kenyas-mau-forest/">politically well-connected companies</a> held a monopoly over the production and export of wood products. </p>
<p>In 1999, forest management was still regulated by the <a href="https://faolex.fao.org/docs/pdf/ken3176.pdf">1960 Forest Act</a>. This law was widely held responsible for legal forest destruction by allowing the minister for forestry to <a href="https://faolex.fao.org/docs/pdf/ken3176.pdf#page=3">convert the legal status of public forest land</a> through a simple order published in the government Gazette. </p>
<p>However, even after the adoption of the landmark <a href="http://kenyalaw.org/kl/fileadmin/pdfdownloads/Acts/ForestsAct_No7of2005.pdf">2005 Forests Act</a> and the formation of the <a href="https://www.environment.go.ke/kfs/">Kenya Forest Service</a> in 2007, the situation didn’t change as much as it should have. Existing regulations were poorly applied. </p>
<p><a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/how-moi-played-role-in-plunder-of-greater-mau-forest-206962">Corruption</a> played a part in forest destruction by both big timber companies and small-scale saw millers. The Kenya Forest Service has repeatedly been named in this context in both <a href="https://www.worldwildlife.org/pages/tnrc-topic-brief-anti-corruption-and-equitable-benefit-sharing-in-kenya-s-wildlife-and-forest-sectors-gaps-and-lessons">academic</a> and public inquiries, including a <a href="https://dc.sourceafrica.net/documents/119389-2018-Taskforce-Report-on-Forest-Resources.html">2018 investigation</a>. </p>
<h2>What is the current political context?</h2>
<p>The political climate in Kenya is <a href="https://acleddata.com/2023/04/28/kenya-situation-update-april-2023-rise-in-disorder-as-opposition-stages-mass-demonstrations/">heated</a>. </p>
<p>Ruto has been under tremendous pressure since he took office in September 2022. The opposition has <a href="https://theconversation.com/mass-protests-in-kenya-have-a-long-and-rich-history-but-have-been-hijacked-by-the-elites-202979">mobilised public protests</a> over the cost of living. Sending a message about creating jobs can be read as an attempt to address people’s worries related to the economy. </p>
<p>At the same time, discussing forests can be interpreted as directly engaging opposition leader Raila Odinga, who <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/raila-s-campaign-blitz-to-save-the-mau-669288">led the “Save the Mau” campaign</a> until its abrupt halt in 2010-11. Ruto and his allies played an important role in the halt. </p>
<p>During Kenya’s 2022 electoral campaign, Ruto promised change and economic empowerment through a <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/the-six-pillars-of-dp-rutos-bottom-up-economic-model-and-why-he-believes-it-is-the-solution-n301225">bottom-up development model</a>. Redistributing access to and benefits from the country’s forests might speak to many rural people and communities who are dependent on forest commodities – and to their political representatives. And having inherited a <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/index.php/public-debt-stock-projected-surpass-kshs-10-trillion-mark-june-2024#:%7E:text=As%20of%20January%202023%2C%20the,a%20threshold%20of%2055%20percent.">deeply indebted economy</a>, Ruto has been looking for new avenues to generate revenue.</p>
<h2>What’s the way forward?</h2>
<p>Depoliticising environmental and forest conservation will help in seeking sustainable solutions. It will be particularly important to address the speculation over the lifting of the logging ban. The environment ministry <a href="https://www.environment.go.ke/logging-ban-lifted-in-commercial-forests-only-cs-tuya-reiterates/">recently said</a> the ban had been lifted only in commercial forests.</p>
<p>During <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781847013477/a-political-ecology-of-kenyas-mau-forest/">my research in the Eastern Mau Forest</a>, it became evident that political changes – or even the fear of political changes which could result in a redistribution of access and user rights – led to what local residents described as a “cutting craze”. </p>
<p>Timber companies, small- and medium-sized sawmills, and even ordinary community members all took extremely short-term approaches to securing benefits from the forest and its resources. </p>
<p><a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/kenyans-invade-forests-for-charcoal-after-lifting-of-ban-4302878">Short-term vision</a> has harmed the country and the environment in Kenya and globally. </p>
<p>Sustainable forest management (which includes both forest production and forest conservation) is not impossible or awfully complicated – at least when it’s not politicised. It mainly requires real political will.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/209981/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lisa E. Fuchs does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Kenyan state has historically viewed forests in terms of production and economic development – not biodiversity and conservation.Lisa E. Fuchs, Independent researcher, French Institute for Research in Africa in Nairobi (IFRA-Nairobi)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2079302023-07-19T14:08:02Z2023-07-19T14:08:02ZKenya’s politicians continue to use ethnicity to divide and rule – 60 years after independence<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/535299/original/file-20230703-259537-edbjvx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Protesters in Kisumu confront police officers after Kenya's disputed 2017 elections. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since independence in 1963, Kenya’s politicians have fed and manipulated ethnicity to win elections. </p>
<p>With some 40-odd ethnic groups, Kenya is a country of ethnic minorities – it has no single dominant community. During elections, political parties and candidates <a href="https://carnegieendowment.org/2022/07/27/specter-of-politics-as-usual-in-kenya-s-2022-election-pub-87578">do raise policy issues</a>, but ethnicity, or tribalism as it’s popularly called in Kenya, is the default vote-hunting strategy. </p>
<p>With few deviations, voting is akin to an ethnic census. Leading presidential candidates are usually from the populous ethnic groups. Of Kenya’s five presidents – three have been Kikuyu and two Kalenjin – come from two of the country’s biggest communities. This has raised <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-62373083">issues of exclusion and fanned ethnic animosity</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320132659_The_Kenyan_State_and_the_Ethnicity_Challenge">My research</a> into <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Political-Power-Tribalism-Westen-Shilaho/dp/331965294X">ethnicity in Kenya</a> has found that it is central to political power. The two have a symbiotic relationship. In my view, ethnicity is not an expression of cultural identity or a reservoir of talent for nation building. It has been politicised and is linked to social status. It determines people’s fortunes, making it integral to social mobility, stagnation or regression.</p>
<p>Since no single ethnic group is populous enough to politically impose its will on others, winning presidential candidates have had to build alliances with other ethnic groups. Political elites have <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Political-Power-Tribalism-Westen-Shilaho/dp/331965294X">built ethnicity into the system of governance and administration</a>. </p>
<p>For self-preservation, successive governments have arbitrarily <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/kenyans-of-indian-descent-become-44th-tribe-428220">created more ethnic groups</a>. They have cemented ethnically based administrative units and emphasised ethnic differences. </p>
<p>This has normalised the exploitation of ethnicity for political and economic gain. The populace buys into ethnic politics under the false hope that their respective ethnic leaders will help them better their lives.</p>
<h2>How ethnicity plays out</h2>
<p>Throughout 60 years of independence, Kenya has held <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322533176_'I_do_not_know_who_won_the_elections'_How_Not_to_Conduct_Elections_and_Kenya's_Democratic_Reversals">inconclusive elections</a> marred by rigging and executive interference. The transitional elections held in 2002 and 2022, however, were exceptions. Electoral disputes are <a href="https://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1023&context=scr">often protracted</a>. They can degenerate into <a href="https://www.ispionline.it/en/publication/ethnicity-and-violence-new-dynamics-kenyas-elections-35968">inter-ethnic violence</a>. </p>
<p>Ethnic politics in Kenya manifests itself in four major ways. </p>
<p>First, the Kenyan state is <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/347999393_Ethnicity_and_Political_Pluralism_in_Kenya_in_Journal_of_African_Elections_Special_Issue_Kenya_72_pp_77-112">colonial in orientation</a>. It is extractive, discriminatory and oppressive. It is also insidiously ethnicised, elitist and classist. Successive Kenyan presidents, starting with the first, Jomo Kenyatta, anchored the state to ethnicity. </p>
<p>Second, historical land injustices in which communities and individuals have been dispossessed of their ancestral land – first by colonialists and then the post-colonial elite – manifests in ethnic politics and electoral violence. A lack of justice across the board, and especially for <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/news/statement-prosecutor-international-criminal-court-fatou-bensouda-status-government-kenyas-0">victims of state-instigated ethnic violence</a>, has also contributed to ethnic consciousness. </p>
<p>Third, institutional disregard for the rule of law makes ethnic politics attractive, with the political elite evoking it to evade accountability. Their deliberate effort to erase memory and distort Kenya’s contested history fuels ethnicity, too. So does a lack of trust among the people, and between the people and the government. </p>
<p>Fourth, ethno-regional political figures – essentially, personality cults – have an outsized influence on Kenyans’ psyche and political choices. This comes at the expense of civic identity, personal agency and a pursuit of collective aspirations. </p>
<p>Ethnicity often <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-political-elites-switch-parties-with-every-election-how-this-fuels-violence-205005">determines party loyalty</a>. Individuals form political parties under the assumption that members of their ethnic group will rally behind them. Further, since independence, the president’s co-ethnics have <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/nairobi/article/2001385110/six-tribes-dominate-top-government-jobs-report">disproportionately held state positions</a>. </p>
<p>Ethnicity has been on the upsurge with urbanisation in Kenya. Contrary to popular belief, the <a href="https://www.khrc.or.ke/index.php/publications/183-ethnicity-and-politicization-in-kenya/file">Kenyan elite are fixated on ethnicity</a> – not the masses – since it determines access to the benefits of modernity. The elite tend to advance their political and economic interests through ethnicity. This has made it pervasive in the media, academy, politics, religious formations, civil society and state apparatus.</p>
<p>There is a link between ethnicity, elite ambitions and the impact of modernisation. Missionary education and the spread of infrastructure affected Kenyan communities differently. So did nature, which gave some communities arable land and others harsh environments. Disparities in development provide a basis for ethnicity. </p>
<h2>False starts</h2>
<p>Kenya’s <a href="http://kenyalaw.org/lex/actview.xql?actid=Const2010">2010 constitution</a> sought to neutralise ethnicity. It requires that state appointments <a href="http://kenyalaw.org/lex/actview.xql?actid=Const2010#chp_Seven">reflect Kenya’s diversity and enhance inclusivity</a>. It also seeks to <a href="https://klrc.go.ke/index.php/constitution-of-kenya/172-chapter-seven-representation-of-the-people/part-3-political-parties/258-91-basic-requirements-for-political-parties">streamline political parties</a> to enhance national cohesion and harmony. </p>
<p>The constitution also provides for the <a href="https://klrc.go.ke/index.php/constitution-of-kenya/139-chapter-eleven-devolved-government/part-1-objects-and-principles-of-devolved-government/343-174-objects-of-devolution">devolution of power and resources</a> through county governments. This aims to cure winner-take-all politics, which has fuelled resentment and animosity. </p>
<p>The constitution, however, is only as good as society’s political culture and norms. It cannot transform Kenyan society by itself. Governance shortfalls and excesses that have undermined the state for decades persist. </p>
<p>Ethnicity hasn’t always been Kenya’s bugbear. In elections held before independence in 1962, for instance, candidates won elections on the strength of vision and national appeal. <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/weekly-review/kenya-s-president-who-never-was-cia-files-reveal-fresh-details-about-tom-mboya-4297404#:%7E:text=Two%20years%20before%20Mboya%20was,he%20had%20acquired%20many%20enemies.">Tom Mboya</a>, a Luo, defeated <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/jomo-s-foreign-minister-dr-munyua-waiyaki-dies-at-91-389930">Munyua Waiyaki</a>, a Kikuyu, in a Kikuyu-dominated constituency. </p>
<p>However, ethnic consciousness heightened after a fallout among the post-colonial elite. The quest to monopolise political power and control national resources raised the stakes. This resulted in <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Political-Power-Tribalism-Westen-Shilaho/dp/331965294X">political assassinations, authoritarianism and a constriction of the political space</a>. Some politicians abandoned policy-oriented programmatic politics and resorted to ethnic mobilisation to claw back receding influence. </p>
<p>Kenya’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-young-voters-have-a-dilemma-they-dislike-ethnic-politics-but-feel-trapped-in-it-186855">inability to transcend the ethnic ideology</a> has made it hard to devise alternative bases for political organisation. </p>
<h2>Class vs tribe</h2>
<p>Kinship ties and ethnic bigotry have trumped class-based national identities. In the lead-up to Kenya’s 2022 elections, opponents of class politics <a href="https://africanarguments.org/2022/07/three-reasons-ethnicity-will-count-for-less-in-kenya-upcoming-vote/">equated it to ethnic politics</a>. They claimed it sought to incite the poor against the rich. </p>
<p>Unlike ethnic politics, however, <a href="https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article/122/487/205/7133587">class politics is programmatic</a>. It is not based on primordial identities and differences. It affords people an opportunity to resolve social, economic and political concerns through the ballot. </p>
<p>William Ruto, as a presidential candidate in 2022, shifted the discourse from <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-election-promises-an-economists-perspective-186480">ethnicity to the economy</a> through a “<a href="https://globalchallenges.ch/issue/9/hustlers-versus-dynasty-kenyas-new-class-politics/">hustlers vs dynasties</a>” ideology. He prevailed. Had Ruto designed his <a href="https://theconversation.com/william-ruto-how-kenyas-new-president-took-on-powerful-political-dynasties-178787">strategy</a> solely around ethnicity, he would likely have been defeated – the opposition lived true to tradition and crafted a <a href="https://www.capitalfm.co.ke/news/2021/12/raila-unveils-odm-led-azimio-la-umoja-alliance-for-2022-race/">broader ethnic alliance</a>.</p>
<p>While Ruto’s margin of victory was thin – just over <a href="https://www.iebc.or.ke/uploads/resources/QLTlLJx0Vr.pdf#page=3">230,000 votes</a> – it illustrates that Kenya is not impervious to class politics as an alternative form of political organisation. </p>
<h2>Next steps</h2>
<p>Moving away from ethnic politics requires an overhaul of the Kenyan state to ensure social justice, the rule of law and access to opportunities for all. This would begin to dismantle ethnicity as an operative ideology. </p>
<p>It requires decolonising the state to rid it of oppressive, extractive and predatory inclinations. This has to start with an overhaul of the education system to make it relevant to Kenyan society. There is need to empower the minds of citizens by instilling in them a sense of national pride and consciousness. </p>
<p>The trouble is that the political elite have no incentive for such reform – it would render them vulnerable to a conscious citizenry.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207930/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Westen K Shilaho does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Kenya’s inability to move past ethnic ideology has made it difficult to develop alternative bases for political organisation.Westen K Shilaho, Senior Research Fellow, Institute for PanAfrican Thought and Conversation (IPATC), University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2082422023-07-09T11:35:15Z2023-07-09T11:35:15ZKenya at 60: six key moments that shaped post-colonial politics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533521/original/file-20230622-8708-1flywg.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Kenya's first president Jomo Kenyatta waves at a crowd. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Harry Benson/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Kenya celebrates 60 years of independence this year. As a political scientist who has <a href="https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/pais/people/lynch/">studied</a> Kenya for the past 20 years, I consider a turning point from each decade that helped to shape the east African country’s post-colonial politics. I haven’t selected elections, assassinations or other moments that have enjoyed much coverage over the years. Instead, I turn to often-forgotten moments that shed light on the country’s key steps forward – and backwards – and the role of agency and institutions.</em></p>
<h2>1964: The Lanet mutiny</h2>
<p>In the 1960s and 1970s, governments across <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170808104534id_/http://www.jonathanmpowell.com/uploads/2/9/9/2/2992308/mcgowan_2003jmas_-_african_military_coups_1956-2001-_frequency_trends_and_distribution.pdf">Africa fell</a> to military coups and countercoups. These nations suffered the arbitrary and authoritarian rule of <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-modern-african-studies/article/ethnic-inequalities-in-kenya/EAFC4455E840815B624147EE930C1C34">military leaders</a>. </p>
<p>Kenya managed to avoid this fate. A regiment based at Lanet in Nakuru did stage an unsuccessful mutiny in 1964. In response, Kenya’s first president, Jomo Kenyatta – as Kenyan political scholar <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-kenyan-politics-9780192887429?cc=us&lang=en&#">Musambayi Katumanga</a> has detailed – opted to keep the military small. He relied instead on various police units. </p>
<p>Kenyatta also “gradually altered the military’s ethnic composition”, which, at that time, was disproportionately composed of officers from Kalenjin, Kamba, Samburu and Somali communities. He increased the number of co-ethnic Kikuyu, Kenya’s largest and most economically dominant ethnic group. </p>
<p>These measures helped to ensure the military’s loyalty to the regime. But at a cost. The multiplication of security units undermined control and <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-kenyan-politics-9780192887429?cc=us&lang=en&#">accountabiliy</a>. </p>
<p>The strategy of ethnic recruitment and promotion reinforced a sense of an ethnically biased state. It was a <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-kenyan-politics-9780192887429?cc=us&lang=en&#">strategy copied</a> by Kenyatta’s successor, Daniel arap Moi, after a <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/nation-prime/how-ochuka-coup-attempt-changed-kenya-1910656">coup attempt in 1982</a>. Kenya’s third president, Mwai Kibaki, also adopted it after the country’s <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2013/3/3/kenya-what-went-wrong-in-2007">2007/8 post-election crisis</a>.</p>
<h2>1976: The Change the Constitution Movement</h2>
<p>By the mid-1970s, Kenyatta was unwell. To prevent the automatic succession of his vice-president, Moi, a group of prominent Kikuyu politicians attempted to <a href="https://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft9h4nb6fv&chunk.id=d0e2582&toc.depth=1&brand=ucpress">change the constitution</a>. Their efforts were unsuccessful. Power transferred peacefully to Moi upon Kenyatta’s death in 1978. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, the attempt had three important legacies:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>the military had once again been kept out of national politics </p></li>
<li><p>the new president was made acutely aware of the insecurity of his position</p></li>
<li><p>a popular sense grew of how a Kikuyu elite felt entitled to rule.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>1980: The crackdown begins</h2>
<p>For the first year or so, Moi largely followed in Kenyatta’s footsteps, or “nyayo” in Kiswahili. He blocked any real opposition but left space for broader political debate. </p>
<p>However, in 1980, Moi’s more authoritarian streak began to show. He banned the Nairobi University Students’ Organisation and deregistered the University Academic Staff Union and Kenya Civil Servants Union. He also ordered ethnicity-based associations to wind up their affairs in the interest of “national unity”. </p>
<p>Authoritarianism came to characterise the 1980s as people were required to follow in Moi’s footsteps. </p>
<h2>1990: Timothy Njoya’s new year speech</h2>
<p>In November 1991, the <a href="https://clubdeparis.org/">Paris Club of donors</a>, an informal group of western creditors, suspended US$350 million in aid to Kenya until political reforms were initiated. The following month, a constitutional amendment was rushed through parliament, paving the way for a return to multi-party elections. </p>
<p>This timeline could mistakenly be taken to suggest that it was donor pressure that forced constitutional reform. But there was already substantive pressure for multi-party politics from within Kenya. </p>
<p>A tidal change occurred at the dawn of 1990 when, in a new year speech, theologian Timothy Njoya <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=tmmTQgt0iXQC&oi=fnd&pg=PR5&dq=i+say+to+you+ethnic+politics+kenya+lynch+&ots=u7HbNNpU6Q&sig=Fc0hDJagdL31LFjKxkRkf8E4qkc&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=i%20say%20to%20you%20ethnic%20politics%20kenya%20lynch&f=false">speculated</a> on how much longer Kenya would be a one-party state. Opposition elements –- most notably, religious and civil society leaders, and politicians marginalised from the political centre –- became increasingly vocal in their demands for multi-party politics.</p>
<p>It was these domestic demands – together with the threat of suspended aid – that forced Moi’s hand and prompted a return to multi-party politics in the early 1990s. Still, Moi <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-kenyan-politics-9780192887429?cc=us&lang=en&#">sought to control</a> the transition. </p>
<h2>2005: The constitutional referendum</h2>
<p>In 2002, Kibaki and the National Rainbow Coalition ousted independence party Kanu in a landslide victory. This prompted a moment of <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3518447">great optimism</a> in Kenya. </p>
<p>However, divisions soon wracked the coalition as <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10246029.2005.9627591">reports emerged</a> of corruption scandals and ethnic bias. Promises of constitutional reform were watered down. Popular frustration showed when Kenyans rejected the draft constitution in the 2005 <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00020180601035674">referendum</a>.</p>
<p>The referendum and general elections that followed meant that Kenya was in intense campaign period for over two years. This elongated campaign drew attention to frustrated hopes. It also presented the government as <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00020180601035674">from and for the Kikuyu</a>. </p>
<p>The referendum also increased confidence in the electoral commission. This meant that people paid relatively little attention to developments like Kibaki’s unilateral <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17531055.2019.1592326">judicial appointments</a>. </p>
<p>Finally, the referendum fostered a sense that the opposition would win the 2007 election unless it was rigged. Together with a <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/67654/elections-ke-2007.pdf">problematic election</a> and history of unpunished election-related violence, these factors fuelled Kenya’s greatest post-colonial crisis. More than 1,000 people were killed and almost <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03056240903346194">700,000 displaced</a> in violence after the 2007 election.</p>
<h2>2011: A new chief justice</h2>
<p>The 2007/8 crisis paved the way for a new <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/sites/default/files/2023-03/The_Constitution_of_Kenya_2010.pdf">constitution</a> in 2010. Among other things, it devolved power to 47 new county governments. It also established a new bill of rights and created the supreme court. The latter has exclusive jurisdiction to hear and determine presidential election petitions, and determine appeals from the court of appeal. It also determines cases that involve interpretation or application of the constitution. </p>
<p>As the highest court in the land, the leadership of the supreme court is critical. It marked a turning point when Willy Mutunga –- a highly respected human rights advocate –- was appointed as the court’s first chief justice. Some criticise Mutunga for having <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17531055.2015.1029296">validated</a> Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto’s election in 2013. However, he also presided over <a href="http://www.saflii.org/za/journals/SPECJU/2015/6.html">decisions</a> that protected the devolution of power and the bill of rights. And he oversaw <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/article/kenyas-democracy-hinges-strong-chief-justice">reforms and judicial learnings</a> that helped to establish a more independent court. Reforms that – together with his successor’s brave leadership – made the supreme court’s <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-election-court/kenyan-court-scraps-presidential-vote-kenyatta-calls-for-calm-idUSKCN1BC4A5">annulment of the August 2017 election</a> possible.</p>
<p>The lesson from these moments: individuals can make a difference for good or bad, particularly when they help to reshape the institutions that will outlive them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208242/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>In recent years Gabrielle Lynch has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, and University of Warwick. </span></em></p>Jomo Kenyatta and his successor Daniel arap Moi set the tone for ethnic and authoritarian politics which Kenya has wrestled to free itself from in recent decades.Gabrielle Lynch, Professor of Comparative Politics, University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2070662023-06-13T09:57:26Z2023-06-13T09:57:26ZKenya’s budget doesn’t allocate funds for new education initiatives – this will stall innovation in the country<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530394/original/file-20230606-19-nycs2i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Kenya has over 18.2 million children and youth in educational institutions.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wolfgang Kaehler/LightRocket via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>President William Ruto’s first budget for Kenya sets no education priorities. The <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/sites/default/files/2023-05/THE%20FINANCE%20BILL%20%2C%202023_compressed.pdf">Finance Bill 2023</a> doesn’t make it clear what Kenya is trying to achieve – stronger foundational learning, technical and vocational skills, or innovation. </p>
<p>This is despite the <a href="https://www.education.go.ke/president-ruto-technical-training-will-drive-our-economic-growth">importance</a> placed on deepening technical capacity to drive economic growth, and education reforms spelt out in the <a href="https://www.education.go.ke/sites/default/files/2022-05/COMPETENCY-BASED-EDUCATION-AND-TRAINING-CBET-POLICY-FRAMEWORK1.pdf">official policy</a>. This also comes against the backdrop of a <a href="https://africacheck.org/sites/default/files/media/documents/2022-08/Kenya%20Kwanza%20UDA%20Manifesto%202022.pdf#page=51">political campaign promise</a> to “bridge current teacher shortage gap of 116,000 within two financial years”.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.treasury.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/2023-Budget-Policy-Statement.pdf#page=66">allocation</a> to education in the 2023/24 budget stands at KSh597.2 billion (US$4.59 billion) compared to US$4.19 billion in the previous year, an increase of 10%. This is far above the US$3.52 billion combined allocations for <a href="https://www.treasury.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/2023-Budget-Policy-Statement.pdf#page=115">health</a>, <a href="https://www.treasury.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/2023-Budget-Policy-Statement.pdf#page=59">agriculture</a>, <a href="https://www.treasury.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/2023-Budget-Policy-Statement.pdf#page=68">security</a> and the <a href="https://www.treasury.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/2023-Budget-Policy-Statement.pdf#page=118">executive office of the president</a>. </p>
<p>The four main spending areas for education are: basic education (primary and secondary); technical and vocational training; higher education and research; and the Teachers’ Service Commission (the national teachers’ employer). Of these, basic education has received the biggest increase in funds.</p>
<p>But it appears the spending won’t be directed to anything new. As usual, the government will subsidise basic education, provide bursaries and loans to students in tertiary institutions, and pay teachers in public institutions. The budgetary allocations imply that there will be no new initiatives in the next financial year. </p>
<p>As a researcher with more than 20 years of <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Moses-Ngware">experience</a> in the education sector, I think a failure to allocate more funds for priority initiatives – such as competence-based education and junior secondary schools – will hamper the sector’s resilience (after <a href="https://theconversation.com/deeper-divide-what-kenyas-pandemic-school-closures-left-in-their-wake-176098">COVID-19 school closures</a>), stall improvement in learning outcomes and delay Kenya’s capacity for innovation.</p>
<h2>Teacher budget</h2>
<p>The Teachers’ Service Commission is set to receive 54% of the education budget in 2023/24 (down from 55% in last fiscal year).</p>
<p>The allocation – mainly to pay salaries – is set to increase by about 8%. The <a href="https://www.knbs.or.ke/consumer-price-indices-and-inflation-rates-for-may-2023/">annual inflation rate</a> is 8%. </p>
<p>But the number of teachers will increase by about 3,700. Between 2021 and 2022, the number of primary school teachers <a href="https://www.knbs.or.ke/download/economic-survey-2023/">declined</a> by about 0.4%, while that of secondary school teachers increased by 4%. So the budget increase won’t make much real difference to teacher pay. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-school-reform-is-entering-a-new-phase-in-2023-but-the-country-isnt-ready-197202">Kenya's school reform is entering a new phase in 2023 -- but the country isn't ready</a>
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<p>The increase in the number of teachers won’t improve the pupil-teacher ratio (number of pupils for every teacher) either. In regions such as <a href="https://sokodirectory.com/2022/03/poor-student-teacher-ratio-affecting-learning-outcomes-across-kenya/">North Eastern</a> Kenya, the ratio is at 70 pupils to one teacher. It doesn’t cater for the <a href="https://www.knbs.or.ke/download/economic-survey-2023/">growing</a> number of pupil enrolments: 245,000 a year. </p>
<p>While the <a href="https://www.tsc.go.ke/index.php/downloads-b/category/99-current-adverts">policy intent</a> is to increase the number of teachers in support of quality of education, the Finance Bill 2023 cannot afford this. If the government were to employ an additional 20,000 teachers for primary and secondary schools, over and above replacing teachers who retired or resigned, their pay would account for 60% of the education budget. </p>
<h2>Higher education and research</h2>
<p>University enrolment <a href="https://www.treasury.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/KNBS-Popular-Version-BOOK-PRESS-%E2%88%9A.pdf#page=26">grew</a> marginally by 0.16%, from 562,100 to 563,000 last year.</p>
<p>In the 2023/24 budget, public universities and research are allocated 20% of the education budget, the same as in the previous year. The university allocation covers both staff costs and direct programme costs. The National Research Fund and National Commission for Science, Technology and Innovation draw from this budget. </p>
<p>The university education budget has increased by about 7%, mainly to cater for changes in staff pay, enhance student higher education loans and deal with pending bills. This implies a “business as usual” approach for university education. </p>
<p>The budget for research and development (Ksh847 million or US$6.52 million) has declined by almost 20% from the previous financial year, implying the government’s low priority for research and development. </p>
<p>This dims the hopes of fostering a research and innovation-driven economy. There is no country in the world that has ever achieved its social and economic goals without heavy investment in research and development.</p>
<p>The research and development financing gap will likely be filled by NGOs and external partners who, in the absence of strong research co-design mechanisms, will most likely push their own research agenda, not the domestic research priorities defined by ministries.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.unesco.org/en/articles/report-reveals-relatively-high-researcher-density-mauritius">Mauritius’ spending </a> on research and development stands at 0.37% of GDP while Kenya’s is at 0.01% of GDP. </p>
<h2>Basic education</h2>
<p>Kenya has <a href="https://www.knbs.or.ke/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/2022-Economic-Survey1.pdf#page=338">18.2 million</a> children and youth in education and training institutions. Of these, 14.2 million are in primary and secondary schools, and <a href="https://www.knbs.or.ke/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/2022-Economic-Survey1.pdf#page=341">2.9 million</a> in early childhood education.</p>
<p>The non-salary allocation to basic education is 22% of the education budget, the same proportion as the previous year. Basic education’s budget grows by 17% in 2023/24. </p>
<p>This is partly explained by the inclusion of curriculum reforms into this budget. The reforms emphasise acquisition of competencies, and also changed the structure of the education system where learners now spend two years in pre-primary, six in primary, six in secondary schools and three in tertiary institutions.</p>
<p>The budgetary allocation doesn’t reflect <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2022/06/23/70-of-10-year-olds-now-in-learning-poverty-unable-to-read-and-understand-a-simple-text">needs created by the COVID-19</a> school closures, such as addressing the <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2022/06/23/70-of-10-year-olds-now-in-learning-poverty-unable-to-read-and-understand-a-simple-text">decline</a> in learning, and providing resources for foundational literacy and numeracy. </p>
<h2>Technical and vocational education and training</h2>
<p>Kenya <a href="https://www.treasury.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/KNBS-Popular-Version-BOOK-PRESS-%E2%88%9A.pdf#page=26">had 580,500</a> young people in technical and vocational education and training in 2022, representing 11.6% growth over 520,200 in 2021.</p>
<p>This sector is critical because unemployment among youth aged 15 to 24 <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/812147/youth-unemployment-rate-in-kenya/#:%7E:text=In%202022%2C%20the%20youth%20unemployment,unchanged%20at%20around%2013.35%20percent">stands at around 13.4%</a>. The budget for the sector has risen by about 10% compared to the previous financial year. It gets a very small but growing proportion (about 5%) of the education budget. </p>
<p>At this rate, technical institutions will <a href="https://www.education.go.ke/president-ruto-technical-training-will-drive-our-economic-growth">overtake</a> the university budget in future, a deliberate policy. Currently, enrolment in technical institutions in Kenya matches enrolment in universities. </p>
<p>But the Finance Bill 2023 could have done more. Like its predecessors, it has failed to provide for training in the workplace, a move that would make skills more relevant to employers.</p>
<h2>What lies ahead</h2>
<p>The Finance Bill 2023 provides an indication of where education money is going and it’s clear that the silent budgeting policy was largely to maintain the status quo. </p>
<p>On the positive side, the increments will cushion the system against high prices of goods due to inflation, unpaid bills, staff annual statutory increments and deductions. </p>
<p>On the downside, it will expose the system to learning crises and low productivity in good research and innovation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207066/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Moses Ngware receives funding from Echidna Giving, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Center for Global Development, and Well Springs Philanthropic Fund. </span></em></p>Kenya’s budgetary allocation misses opportunities to improve basic education and address unemployment.Moses Ngware, Senior Research Scientist, African Population and Health Research CenterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2069912023-06-09T11:04:40Z2023-06-09T11:04:40ZKenya’s new spy chief will lead the national intelligence service – what the job is all about<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530379/original/file-20230606-21-9adq4m.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Kenya’s President William Ruto recently nominated a <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/return-to-spy-roots-ruto-nominates-noordin-haji-for-top-nis-role-4237026">new national intelligence chief</a>. Breaking with tradition, the president picked a <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/weekly-review/noordin-haji-the-kenyan-spy-who-came-from-the-cold-4260316">career intelligence officer</a>, Noordin Haji. </p>
<p>But what is national intelligence and what work does it do, particularly in Kenya? Since <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20071222015716/http://www.nsis.go.ke/about.php">1999</a>, the country’s spy chiefs have been picked from <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000132285/major-general-philip-wachira-kameru-is-president-uhuru-choice-for-gichangi-successor-at-nis">the military</a>. Haji was previously the director of public prosecutions. </p>
<p>Parliament vetted Haji, in keeping with the <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/sites/default/files/2017-05/PublicAppointmentsParliamentaryApprovalAct_No33of2011.pdf#page=6">law on public appointments</a>. Legislators <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/former-dpp-noordin-haji-sworn-in-as-nis-director-general-4269530">approved</a> his nomination to the <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/index.html">National Intelligence Service</a> as director-general. </p>
<p>Ruto’s choice reflects his <a href="https://africacheck.org/sites/default/files/media/documents/2022-08/Kenya%20Kwanza%20UDA%20Manifesto%202022.pdf#page=62">election pledges</a> on security sector reforms. He said he would end political interference, extrajudicial killings, ineffective oversight and poor accountability in the sector. </p>
<p>In my view as a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=6iQ6w3MAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">political scientist</a> who has studied Kenya’s counter-terrorism policies and strategies, Haji could improve civilian oversight and accountability in the intelligence service. Civilian leadership could also help establish a service that adheres to the law and respects human rights. Its covert operations <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/03/24/investigation-highlights-transparency-need-us-uk-roles-kenyan-counterterrorism">haven’t always</a> fallen within the law.</p>
<h2>What is intelligence?</h2>
<p>Intelligence is information that can avert threats to national security or promote national interests. </p>
<p>Intelligence services are state agencies that <a href="https://www.dcaf.ch/sites/default/files/publications/documents/DCAF_BG_12_Intelligence%20Services.pdf#page=2">produce</a> reports to help maintain national security. These reports also provide strategic information relevant to a country’s economic growth. </p>
<p>By providing <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-terror-alerts-political-scientist-unpacks-the-intelligence-behind-them-176072">reliable information</a> about potential threats to national security, intelligence agencies contribute to peace and stability. This supports a country’s social, economic and political development.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-terror-alerts-political-scientist-unpacks-the-intelligence-behind-them-176072">Kenya terror alerts: political scientist unpacks the intelligence behind them</a>
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<p>The information such agencies gather is classified as counter-intelligence, domestic intelligence or external intelligence. Kenya’s <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/structure.html">National Intelligence Service</a> has three primary divisions responsible for these different kinds of information. </p>
<p>In the Kenyan context, <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/downloads/THE%20NATIONAL%20INTELLIGENCE%20SERVICE%20ACT,%202012.pdf#page=7">counter-intelligence</a> aims to prevent attacks from foreign powers. It also counters subversion, sabotage and espionage. This covers any hostile activity that targets Kenya’s people, institutions, installations or resources. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/downloads/THE%20NATIONAL%20INTELLIGENCE%20SERVICE%20ACT,%202012.pdf#page=7">Domestic intelligence</a> is information about internal threats to national security. <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/downloads/THE%20NATIONAL%20INTELLIGENCE%20SERVICE%20ACT,%202012.pdf#page=8">External intelligence</a> covers any threats to national security from foreign powers.</p>
<p>In Kenya, credible intelligence has foiled several Al-Shabaab <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-terror-alerts-political-scientist-unpacks-the-intelligence-behind-them-176072">terror attacks</a>.</p>
<h2>What are the functions of intelligence?</h2>
<p>The National Intelligence Service <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/downloads/THE%20NATIONAL%20INTELLIGENCE%20SERVICE%20ACT,%202012.pdf#page=13">functions</a> to detect actual and potential national security threats. </p>
<p>It then advises Kenya’s president and government on these threats. It also recommends security intelligence measures for other state agencies to adopt. It advises Kenya’s 47 county governments on security matters. </p>
<p>The intelligence service provides confidential security reports on people who apply for state positions that require vetting. It promotes national interests within and outside Kenya. It supports law enforcement agencies in detecting and preventing serious crimes. </p>
<p>By law, the National Intelligence Service <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/downloads/THE%20NATIONAL%20INTELLIGENCE%20SERVICE%20ACT,%202012.pdf#page=16">isn’t allowed</a> to undertake paramilitary activities. It can’t commit acts of violence against individuals or take part in activities that promote a political organisation. The service falls under the office of the presidency.</p>
<p>It’s a <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/faqs.html">civilian agency</a>. This means it is not legally permitted to carry out police functions, such as <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/faqs.html">search, arrest and prosecution</a>. </p>
<p>Some of the threats it detects, for example terrorism, have criminal implications. In such cases, the <a href="https://www.cid.go.ke/index.php/aboutus/our-functions.html">Directorate of Criminal Investigations</a>, which falls under the National Police Service, investigates and sets the appropriate charge. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-intelligence-agency-needs-speedy-reform-or-it-must-be-shut-down-200386">South Africa's intelligence agency needs speedy reform - or it must be shut down</a>
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<p>There’s an important <a href="https://www.icct.nl/publication/intelligence-failures-france-complex-reality-information-sharing">difference</a> between collecting intelligence for national security and gathering evidence for criminal investigations. </p>
<p>For intelligence services, <a href="https://www.icct.nl/publication/intelligence-failures-france-complex-reality-information-sharing">the secrecy of sources</a> is essential. In criminal investigations, there must be <a href="https://www.icct.nl/publication/intelligence-failures-france-complex-reality-information-sharing">public access to the evidence</a> to deliver a fair trial. </p>
<p>As a former director of public prosecutions, Haji gained experience in gathering information for criminal investigations. This adds to his experience as an intelligence officer. This background could have a positive impact on the service’s intelligence-gathering role. </p>
<h2>How is intelligence gathered?</h2>
<p>This is done through a process known as the <a href="https://www.dcaf.ch/sites/default/files/publications/documents/DCAF_BG_12_Intelligence%20Services.pdf#page=4">intelligence cycle</a>. It includes: </p>
<ul>
<li><p>planning and allocation of resources based on threat assessments</p></li>
<li><p>collecting information on individuals, places, events and activities</p></li>
<li><p>processing and analysing this information</p></li>
<li><p>sharing information with decision-makers </p></li>
<li><p>feedback to intelligence agencies. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>The <a href="https://www.dcaf.ch/sites/default/files/publications/documents/DCAF_BG_12_Intelligence%20Services.pdf#page=4">feedback</a> begins a new cycle.</p>
<p>Kenya’s National Intelligence Service gathers information by working with individuals and organisations. It also cooperates with foreign governments and intelligence agencies, such as the <a href="https://www.mi5.gov.uk/">MI5</a> in the UK. </p>
<p>During his vetting, Haji <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-06-01-haji-outlines-vision-to-reform-nis-bolster-security/">spoke</a> about the value of information from agents, informers and diplomatic attachés.</p>
<p>The service also <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/downloads/THE%20NATIONAL%20INTELLIGENCE%20SERVICE%20ACT,%202012.pdf#page=14">monitors and records</a> data <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-terror-alerts-political-scientist-unpacks-the-intelligence-behind-them-176072">transmitted</a> electronically. This could be via email, instant messaging and mobile phones. </p>
<p>It uses physical tapping or eavesdropping, but must have a <a href="https://www.nis.go.ke/downloads/THE%20NATIONAL%20INTELLIGENCE%20SERVICE%20ACT,%202012.pdf#page=44">warrant</a> issued by a judge to do so.</p>
<h2>Going forward</h2>
<p>During his vetting, Haji listed <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-06-01-haji-outlines-vision-to-reform-nis-bolster-security/">several proposals</a> to make the service more accountable and efficient. They included:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>revising recruitment policies to represent the country’s social diversity, particularly gender</p></li>
<li><p>using modern technology</p></li>
<li><p>improving public relations and employee welfare</p></li>
<li><p>strengthening regional partnerships to address transnational crimes. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>In my view, such efforts could succeed if the country’s leadership commits to them. The state needs to give the service the financial, technological and human resources it requires to be more autonomous.</p>
<p><em>Note: the article was updated to reflect Noordin Haji’s confirmation as director-general of the National Intelligence Service.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206991/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Oscar Gakuo Mwangi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Intelligence reports offer information that can avert threats to national security or promote national interests.Oscar Gakuo Mwangi, Associate Professor, Political Science, University of RwandaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2050052023-05-16T10:59:38Z2023-05-16T10:59:38ZKenya’s political elites switch parties with every election – how this fuels violence<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524923/original/file-20230508-173480-qsf6ds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Supporters at the launch of the Jubilee Party manifesto in Nairobi, Kenya, in June 2017. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/jubilee-party-supporters-of-kenyas-president-uhuru-kenyatta-news-photo/801424352?adppopup=true">Simon Maina/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Barely seven months after leaving office, Kenya’s former president Uhuru Kenyatta <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/kanini-kega-led-jubilee-faction-kicks-out-uhuru-as-party-leader--4220148">is battling</a> to keep together the party that won him a second term and a majority in parliament in 2017. His <a href="https://web.facebook.com/TheJubileeParty/?_rdc=1&_rdr">Jubilee Party</a> performed dismally in the 2022 election. Only 27 out of 290 <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/the-national-assembly/mps">members of the national assembly</a>, four out of 47 <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/the-senate/senators">senators</a> and one county governor out of 47 were elected on its ticket. This isn’t surprising in Kenya where political elites switch parties and coalitions with every election. No political party or coalition has ruled for more than one term since the opposition deposed the independence movement, KANU, in 2002. Gilbert Khadiagala, a political scientist who has researched <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/364268431_Coalition_politics_in_Kenya_Superficial_assemblages_and_momentary_vehicles_to_attain_power">the fluidity of Kenya’s political coalitions</a>, explains the impact of this.</em></p>
<h2>What is the background of Kenya’s fluid political landscape?</h2>
<p>The onset of the multiparty era in the early 1990s <a href="https://www.ohioswallow.com/book/Multi-Party+Politics+in+Kenya">brought</a> a new phase of complex political coalitions and alliances. They were competing against the previously dominant political party, the Kenya African National Union (KANU). Typical of Africa’s post-colonial dominant parties, KANU governed for more than two decades through authoritarian methods. Under presidents Jomo Kenyatta (1963-1978) and Daniel Moi (1978-2002), KANU co-opted opposition figures into an elaborate system of patronage and coerced critics who didn’t toe the party line. </p>
<p>The coalitions that emerged were based primarily on ethnic and regional affiliations – they were overwhelmingly elite-based. The first was the Forum for the Restoration Democracy (<a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Forum-for-the-Restoration-of-Democracy">FORD</a>). However, barely a year into its existence, FORD broke into two major factions – FORD Kenya and FORD Asili – in August 1992. Further splits followed. </p>
<p>The dominant coalitions that participated in the August 2022 elections – the Kenya Kwanza alliance (led by William Ruto) and the Azimio alliance (led by Raila Odinga) – comprise many smaller parties. They are products of previous failed attempts at alliance building.</p>
<p>In 30 years of competitive politics, coalitions were expected to gradually stabilise into coherent political parties with national reach and resonance. Instead, political coalitions in Kenya have not advanced beyond their narrow bases. They remain fundamentally ethnic and regional machines that are frequently scrambled together on the eve of elections to win power. </p>
<p>I have <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3497247/Political_movements_and_coalition_politics_in_Kenya_entrenching_ethnicity">studied</a> Kenya’s politics for 30 years. It’s my view that Kenyan coalitions that rise and fall with every election do not provide the foundation for steady and enduring party systems. These coalitions postpone the evolution of national parties that would lend some predictability and stability to political competition.</p>
<p>Parties should broadly reflect – and manage – societal differences. In Germany, for instance, parties have come together to overcome certain historical differences by calling on shared interests. Germany’s coalition governments are largely based on well-established political parties, not conglomerations concocted before elections as in Kenya. And <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirect/10.1111/nejo.12310">political parties negotiate</a> these governing coalitions after elections, not before.</p>
<p>Throughout Africa, where ethnic and regional divisions are paramount, political mobilisations deepen societal differences. Electoral violence occurs because winning coalitions control all the national resources. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.cfr.org/blog/victors-go-spoils-how-winner-takes-all-politics-undermine-democracy-sierra-leone">winner-takes-all</a> political systems of countries like Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria and Sierra Leone face a related problem: they have very small independent private sectors. So winners are tempted to use political power to <a href="https://www.airuniversity.af.edu/Portals/10/ASPJ_French/journals_E/Volume-08_Issue-2/nsia-pepra_e.pdf">grab</a> national resources. </p>
<h2>What are the main weaknesses of fluid political coalitions?</h2>
<p>They cause instability in the country. Unstable coalitions contribute to electoral violence as losing coalitions vent their grievances. Following the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/12/kenyan-protests-against-kenyatta-election-victory-turn-deadly">violent aftermath</a> of the 2017 Kenyan elections, Odinga’s coalition at the time, the National Super Alliance (NASA), threatened to agitate for the secession of his support base from Kenya. </p>
<p>In 2002, there was a brief phase of optimism for an enduring coalition. The National Rainbow Alliance (NARC), led by Mwai Kibaki, was a grouping of the leading ethnic groups ranged against Moi’s chosen successor, Kenyatta. But it ended in <a href="https://www.csis.org/blogs/smart-global-health/background-post-election-crisis-kenya">civil conflict</a> in 2007-2008 after Kibaki marginalised key allies largely on ethnic and regional lines. </p>
<p>The Government of National Unity <a href="https://successfulsocieties.princeton.edu/sites/g/files/toruqf5601/files/LS_Kenya_Powersharing_FINAL.pdf">crafted</a> by international actors in 2008 became an uneasy and unwieldy coalition. Its members decamped to <a href="https://issafrica.org/iss-today/kenyas-government-of-national-unity-about-to-collapse">new coalitions</a> in the next elections. </p>
<p>Subsequent political alliances have reproduced the conditions for anxiety and chaos after every election. Despite the <a href="http://kenyalaw.org/lex/actview.xql?actid=Const2010">2010 constitution</a> giving more power to Kenya’s 47 counties, political elites remain fixated on <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.1080/14662043.2015.1089006?needAccess=true&role=button">winning presidential elections</a> to gain power at the centre. </p>
<p>The unstable coalitions also account for widespread corruption. Winning coalitions <a href="https://theconversation.com/want-to-run-for-office-in-kenya-heres-how-much-itll-cost-you-183683">expend enormous resources</a> to fortify their power. To do this they have to loot state resources. </p>
<h2>What are the strengths of these loose coalitions?</h2>
<p>In societies where ethnic groups coincide with regions, coalitions are one of the means of organising competitive politics. The loose coalitions enable leaders who neither share policies nor vision to temporarily accommodate each other. This creates a semblance of national unity. The fluid coalitions are, therefore, essential in such political landscapes until national cohesion and coherence are achieved. </p>
<p>When the search for presidential power ceases to be politically relevant and salient, Kenya’s politics will be normalised. Transforming coalitions into solid parties may take time. But it’s the only way out of the prevailing political stalemate. </p>
<h2>What adjustments should be made?</h2>
<p>Kenyans do share basic bread-and-butter interests. When those interests are highlighted – instead of ethnic and regional affiliations – political parties with national outreach could emerge. </p>
<p>It’s elites who emphasise cultural and ethnic differences between regions. They have a large stake in the stalemate continuing, instead of building institutionalised parties. The puzzle for Kenya is how to transform ethnic diversities and identities into the foundations for predictable and organised politics.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205005/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gilbert M. Khadiagala does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The fluidity of the country’s short-lived coalitions is a major cause of instability in Kenya.Gilbert M. Khadiagala, Jan Smuts Professor of International Relations and Director of the African Centre for the Study of the United States (ACSUS), University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2045752023-05-02T09:28:01Z2023-05-02T09:28:01ZQueerphobia in Kenya: a supreme court ruling on gay rights triggers a new wave of anger against the LGBTIQ+ community<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523226/original/file-20230427-16-icyfbv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A demonstrator at Queer Republic protests in Nairobi, Kenya. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">John Ochieng/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The Kenyan supreme court recently struck down a government decision to ban the registration of an LGBTIQ+ community rights organisation, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/3/15/how-an-lgbtq-court-ruling-sent-kenya-into-a-moral-panic">sparking new homophobic rhetoric</a> in the country. Kenya is one of <a href="https://database.ilga.org/criminalisation-consensual-same-sex-sexual-acts">32 African countries</a> that criminalises homosexuality. Those who identify as part of the LGBTIQ+ community are often discriminated against, harassed and assaulted. Lise Woensdregt and Naomi van Stapele, who have researched queer experiences in Kenya for nine years, explain the impact of this ruling.</em></p>
<hr>
<h2>What is the significance of the recent Kenyan supreme court ruling on a gay rights organisation?</h2>
<p>The Kenyan supreme court ruled on 24 February 2023 that <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/10OYaKTuvDvkpBUB5GFLXcf8fmrGFr645/view">the government was wrong</a> to ban the LGBTIQ+ community from registering the <a href="https://nglhrc.com/">National Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission</a>. The commission provides legal aid, and works to change the law and policy around LGBTIQ+ persons in Kenya. The commission <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-64491276">celebrated this court ruling</a> as a small but significant affirmation of its place in Kenyan society.</p>
<p>The ruling, however, didn’t alter the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/05/24/kenya-court-upholds-archaic-anti-homosexuality-laws">Kenyan penal code</a>, which criminalises sexual acts “<a href="https://www.ilo.org/dyn/natlex/docs/ELECTRONIC/28595/115477/F-857725769/KEN28595.pdf#page=62">against the order of nature</a>”. This, in effect, criminalises same-sex sexual acts. Those found guilty <a href="https://icj-kenya.org/?smd_process_download=1&download_id=5018">face</a> up to 14 years in prison.</p>
<p>The law has <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/3/15/how-an-lgbtq-court-ruling-sent-kenya-into-a-moral-panic">fuelled stigma and discrimination</a> against queer individuals, making them more vulnerable to violence. </p>
<p>We have been <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13691058.2020.1842499">studying</a> queer experiences <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13178-018-0337-x">in Nairobi</a>, working closely with LGBTIQ+ self-led organisations. Those involved in <a href="https://northumbriajournals.co.uk/index.php/IJGSL/article/view/1264">our research</a> have been experiencing mounting violence in recent years. The ruling <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-03-16-gay-people-fear-for-their-lives-escape-mombasa-over-planned-demos/">triggered fears</a> among members of the LGBTIQ+ community across Kenya of increased violence.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1636702221743079425"}"></div></p>
<h2>What have the political responses been?</h2>
<p>A backlash against progress in gender and sexual rights is not uncommon. Pushing for progress in these areas can <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-07-27-the-pink-line-the-worlds-queer-frontiers-the-new-book-from-mark-gevisser/#gsc.tab=0">evoke hate and counter-offensives</a>. </p>
<p>The Kenyan government has joined churches and mosques in their vitriol condemning not only the supreme court judges, but also LGBTIQ+ activists, organisations and citizens. For example, a member of parliament declared that being LGBTIQ+ is <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-03-01-lgbtq-is-worse-than-murder-for-us-farah-maalim/">worse than murder</a>. He described homosexuality as </p>
<blockquote>
<p>a foreign practice from the West that’s not aligned with African cultures and as such, severe punishment should be meted out on offenders. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Kenya’s deputy president Rigathi Gachagua added that the government wouldn’t “<a href="https://twitter.com/rigathi/status/1631244014744739841?s=20">condone</a>” same-sex relations, a sentiment shared by president William Ruto. The president <a href="https://www.africanews.com/2023/03/02/we-shall-not-condone-any-attempts-to-legitimise-lgbtq-kenya-deputy-president-warns//">has previously said</a> that unemployment and hunger are the “real” issues, not LGBTIQ+ concerns, and that tradition must be respected. </p>
<p>Kenya’s first lady, <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-03-06-first-lady-to-lead-prayers-against-lgbtq-onslaught-on-family/">Rachel Ruto</a>, has also claimed that LGBTIQ+ people are a threat to the institution of the family. Another member of parliament, Peter Kaluma, recently submitted a <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-04-08-details-of-kalumas-bill-on-criminalising-lgbtq/">family protection bill</a> that includes provisions to criminalise LGBTIQ+ organising, funding and, what is ominously termed, “behaviours”. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-should-decriminalise-homosexuality-4-compelling-reasons-why-203767">Kenya should decriminalise homosexuality: 4 compelling reasons why</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Amid all this, LGBTIQ+ self-led organisations <a href="https://www.galck.org/">have struggled</a> to offer a safe space for individuals to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17450101.2022.2146526?src=">find belonging, acceptance and recognition</a>, and to work towards social, political and economic justice collectively. Some, including those that <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-should-decriminalise-homosexuality-4-compelling-reasons-why-203767">provide HIV services</a>, have <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O89qRCvXDVU&t=4s">had to close</a> for fear of attacks. </p>
<h2>Based on your research, what have you learnt about what it’s like for LGBTIQ+ people in Kenya?</h2>
<p>Over our nine years of research into queer experiences, we’ve worked closely with grassroots LGBTIQ+ organisations and activists. We are continuously in touch with queer activists, who we speak with as part of our ongoing engagement with and support for queer self-led organisations in Kenya. They have told us that the recent supreme court decision was a step towards decriminalising same-sex sexual acts and was cause for celebration. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, the ruling <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/3/15/how-an-lgbtq-court-ruling-sent-kenya-into-a-moral-panic">unleashed vicious anti-LGBTIQ+ attacks</a> targeting organisations, activists and citizens. One young queer activist* told us: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>It is more dangerous now. Our friends are evicted (from their houses). Some have been beaten in the streets. In WhatsApp groups with family or work, people write anti-queer things, and you need to stay silent not to out yourself. You can lose everything if you are found out. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Another queer activist* told us: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>In the WhatsApp group with parents from school, parents write how to warn our children (against) recruitment by LGBTIQ+ people, and I am in that app. I can’t say anything because it will harm my son. </p>
</blockquote>
<p><em>*Those we interviewed are anonymous for safety reasons</em></p>
<h2>What can be done to empower queer individuals and groups in Kenya?</h2>
<p>Many Kenyan LGBTIQ+ self-led organisations collaborate with government agencies – such as the <a href="https://nsdcc.go.ke/about-us/">National Syndemic Diseases Control Council</a> and the <a href="https://www.nascop.or.ke/about-us/">National AIDS and STIs Control Programme</a>. They also <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13178-018-0337-x">work with</a> several national and international civil society organisations on health, women rights, sexual and reproductive rights, and social justice. The silence of LGBTIQ+ partners is deafening. As one queer activist told us: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>They eat with us, but when things get tough, we stand alone.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Eating together here refers to the funds many such organisations receive from donors to work with LGBTIQ+ self-led organisations. </p>
<p>The silence of civil society, including those who collaborate with LGBTIQ+ groups in Kenya and receive funding for this, and the international media is concerning. This silence sends a dangerous message to the government and religious organisations: they can freely target queer individuals and groups without facing resistance or solidarity from the broader community.</p>
<p>The fight for equality and safety for the LGBTIQ+ community requires sustained effort from national and international organisations and governments. On an individual level, financial support is needed as it can empower individuals who identify as LGBTIQ+, providing them with resources, such as the ability to relocate to safer locations. </p>
<p>In our <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13691058.2020.1842499">research</a>, several members told us of the risks they face in Nairobi’s low-income settlements where they live. In these settings, traditional patriarchal masculinity practices – breadwinner-ship, heterosexuality and dominance over women – are celebrated. Not being able to pass as heterosexual is perceived as risky.</p>
<p>Promoting safe spaces and access to stable incomes on a collective level can create a foundation that empowers queer individuals and groups to fight for dignity and respect. </p>
<p>The voices of those affected by anti-LGBTIQ+ violence must be heard and amplified by those who seek a more just and equal world. Only through collective action and solidarity can the LGBTIQ+ community be protected, valued and celebrated.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204575/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Naomi van Stapele is affiliated with Minority Womxn in Action — MWA, a queer activist organisation in Kenya. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lise Woensdregt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A backlash against progress in gender and sexual rights is common.Lise Woensdregt, PhD Candidate in Sociology, Vrije Universiteit AmsterdamNaomi van Stapele, Professor in Inclusive Education, Hague University of Applied SciencesLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2040362023-04-27T12:06:03Z2023-04-27T12:06:03ZPeace in the DRC: East Africa has deployed troops to combat M23 rebels – who’s who in the regional force<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/522646/original/file-20230424-14-adtvfi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South Sudanese soldiers prepare for deployment to the Democratic Republic of Congo. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Samir Bol/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The East Africa Community (EAC) has <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/eacrf-troops-now-fully-deployed-in-drc-4191138">completed the deployment</a> of its regional force in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to oversee the withdrawal of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/m23-four-things-you-should-know-about-the-rebel-groups-campaign-in-rwanda-drc-conflict-195020">rebel group, M23,</a> from the eastern part of the country. </p>
<p>The last contingent was of <a href="https://adf-magazine.com/2023/04/fully-deployed-regional-force-starting-to-impact-eastern-drc/">South Sudanese soldiers</a> who joined troops from Kenya, Burundi and Uganda.</p>
<p>Formed in 2012 as a splinter group of the armed militia <a href="https://www.c-r.org/accord/cross-border-peacebuilding/congo-rwanda-and-national-congress-defence-people">National Congress for the Defence of the People</a>, the M23 briefly occupied the city of Goma the same year. It was quickly routed by forces operating as part of the UN peacekeeping mission, Monusco.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-m23s-on-and-off-insurgency-tells-us-about-drcs-precarious-search-for-peace-182520">M23 re-emerged</a> in 2022, prompting the east African region to send in troops.</p>
<p>While eastern DRC contains over 100 armed groups, the M23 has drawn the region’s attention. This is not only because the conflict could spill across borders, but also because the M23 is <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/eu-urges-rwanda-to-stop-supporting-m23-rebels-in-dr-congo-/6899260.html">widely seen</a> as <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/4/rwanda-backing-m23-rebels-in-drc-un-experts">backed by Rwanda</a> (<a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/dr-congo-accuses-rwanda-of-backing-militia-violence-3828930">a claim Rwanda denies</a>). Thus, a rise in tension could <a href="https://theconversation.com/rwanda-and-drcs-turbulent-past-continues-to-fuel-their-torrid-relationship-188405">reignite fighting</a> between Rwanda and DRC, and draw in the broader region.</p>
<p>The EAC’s forces could be important in bringing the threat posed by the M23 under control, given the regional dimensions to this conflict. But their involvement is complicated.</p>
<p>On the one hand, neighbouring countries often have a better understanding of local political and security contexts than international actors. They also have more direct interest in the outcome of conflict, potentially leading to more sustained engagement.</p>
<p>On the other hand, neighbouring countries have their own interests, which means their actions may not always be in the best interests of the country they’re meant to help. Such risks are especially pronounced in the DRC. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/conflict-in-the-drc-5-articles-that-explain-whats-gone-wrong-195332">Conflict in the DRC: 5 articles that explain what's gone wrong</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The country’s history has been <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-conflicts-intertwined-over-time-and-destabilised-the-drc-and-the-region-185432">rife with meddling</a> by its neighbours, including some members of the EAC regional force. The two Congo wars – <a href="https://www.easterncongo.org/about-drc/history-of-the-conflict/">in 1996-1997 and 1998-2003</a> – brought numerous foreign forces to Congolese soil. </p>
<p>While some neighbouring countries came to support the DRC government, others backed the rebels during the two wars, and actors from multiple sides <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2009/10/report-exploitation-resources-democratic-republic-congo-challenged-security">have pillaged DRC’s natural resources</a>. <a href="https://www.congoresearchgroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/version-anglaise-sondage-gec-ebuteli-deuxieme-note-thematique-force-regionale.pdf#page=4">Public distrust</a> in the regional force is, therefore, high.</p>
<p>Based on <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01436597.2021.1992272">lessons learned</a> from previous interventions in the DRC, it’s not clear whether the EAC regional force will help the DRC find peace this time around or contribute, deliberately or otherwise, to its instability.</p>
<p>Here is a short overview of the players in the regional force and their connections to the DRC.</p>
<h2>Kenya</h2>
<p>Kenya has <a href="https://www.eac.int/eac-partner-states/kenya">relatively more economic resources</a> than some other EAC members and a less complicated history with the DRC. While Kenya has had troops in the country <a href="https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/mission/past/monuc/facts.shtml">since 1999</a> as part of the UN peacekeeping operation, it has been less tangled in previous conflicts in the DRC. </p>
<p>Kenya deployed its troops as part of the regional force in November 2022 after the the M23 enlarged its territorial hold in Congo’s eastern region. </p>
<p>Kenyan president <a href="https://www.africanews.com/2022/11/02/kenya-sends-troops-to-dr-congo-to-fight-rebels//">William Ruto has stated</a> that defeating the M23 is important for the region. Stability in the DRC is also in <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/kenya-why-we-deployed-our-troops-in-drc-4017620">Kenya’s economic interests</a>. It accelerated investments into the DRC after the latter <a href="https://theconversation.com/drc-is-set-to-become-7th-member-of-the-east-africa-trading-bloc-whats-in-it-for-everyone-179320">joined the regional bloc in 2022</a>. </p>
<h2>Burundi</h2>
<p>Burundi has a <a href="https://theconversation.com/burundis-gatumba-massacre-offers-a-window-into-the-past-and-future-of-the-drc-conflict-191351">tangled history with the DRC</a>. It was involved in the two Congo wars and has been <a href="https://www.equalrightstrust.org/ertdocumentbank/DRC%20v%20Burundi,%20Rwanda%20and%20Uganda.pdf#page=1">accused by the DRC</a> of occupying its border provinces and violating human rights and international law during these conflicts.</p>
<p>Burundi formally deployed troops to Goma in <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/22/burundi-sends-troops-to-drc-for-regional-peacekeeping-force">August 2022</a>. A <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/more-burundi-troops-arrive-in-goma-4161608">second battalion</a> was deployed seven months later. But a Burundian rights group has <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/burundi-secretly-sent-troops-to-dr-congo-rights-group-3894150">claimed that Burundi</a> has been conducting secret operations against Burundian opposition groups within DRC for some time. <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/22/burundi-sends-troops-to-drc-for-regional-peacekeeping-force">The group also expressed concern</a> that Burundi may use its membership of the regional force to continue operations against its opponents. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/east-africas-peace-mission-in-the-drc-why-its-in-burundis-interest-to-help-203486">East Africa’s peace mission in the DRC: why it’s in Burundi’s interest to help</a>
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<h2>Uganda</h2>
<p>Uganda <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/uganda-troops-join-eac-force-in-drc-4180430">deployed troops</a> to the force in March 2023. Before this, it conducted <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/1/after-air-raids-uganda-sends-troops-into-drc-to-hunt-adf">joint operations</a> with Congolese national forces against the rebel Allied Democratic Forces, a Uganda-based, Islamic State-allied group that has been <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/africa/20230309-more-than-40-killed-in-suspected-eastern-dr-congo-rebel-attacks">particularly violent towards civilians</a>. </p>
<p>Despite their common foe, Uganda and DRC have a history of tension. Uganda’s military intervention in the DRC in the 1990s was found by the <a href="https://www.icj-cij.org/case/116">International Court of Justice</a> to be “of such magnitude and duration” that it was considered “a grave violation” of the prohibition on the use of force in terms of the UN Charter. The court ordered Uganda to pay US$325 million for its illegal occupation. Uganda made its first payment of <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/12/uganda-pays-first-installment-of-325m-war-reparations-to-drc#:%7E:text=Uganda%20has%20paid%20%2465m,Ugandan%20troops%20occupied%20Congolese%20territory.">US$65 million</a> in September 2022. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-conflicts-intertwined-over-time-and-destabilised-the-drc-and-the-region-185432">How conflicts intertwined over time and destabilised the DRC – and the region</a>
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<p>Ugandan troops have found some early success in their deployment. This includes the area of Bunagana, where they were able to <a href="https://apnews.com/article/congo-drc-rwanda-m23-rebels-uganda-bunagana-58787acda1f5ebc0ee2b3de2cbb12491">regain control</a> of the town that had been held for months by the M23. Nevertheless, Uganda’s involvement in the <a href="https://press.un.org/en/2001/sc7057.doc.htm">illegal exploitation of DRC’s natural resources</a> in the 1990s and early 2000s raises concerns about its presence among the local population. </p>
<h2>South Sudan</h2>
<p>South Sudan is the most recent EAC member state to deploy troops to the DRC after some <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/277626/east-africa-force-in-drc-kenyas-on-the-ground-so-where-are-the-others/">initial logistical delays</a>. South Sudan’s history with the DRC is less contentious than Uganda’s and Burundi’s. However, its national forces have a <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2023/03/un-experts-tell-human-rights-council-violence-against-civilians-persists#:%7E:text=Based%20on%20investigations%20undertaken%20in,and%20State%2Dsponsored%20extrajudicial%20killings.">history of human rights abuses</a> against their own population. </p>
<p>Despite South Sudan president Salva Kiir’s instruction that his troops not “<a href="https://jubaecho.com/president-kiir-flags-off-720-troops-headed-for-drc/">go and rape women and girls</a>”, their presence within the <a href="https://www.accord.org.za/analysis/the-role-progress-and-challenges-of-the-eac-regional-force-in-the-eastern-drc/">crowded theatre could increase the risk</a> of human rights abuses. </p>
<h2>Risky, but necessary?</h2>
<p>Despite these risks, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/east-african-troops-hope-to-bring-peace-in-the-drc-but-there-may-be-stumbling-blocks-195937">EAC regional force</a> may be the DRC’s best chance of defeating the M23. Monusco <a href="https://theconversation.com/protests-against-un-in-eastern-congo-highlight-peace-missions-crisis-of-legitimacy-187932">has struggled</a> to mitigate the M23 or the numerous other rebel groups operating in the eastern region. </p>
<p>One advantage for the EAC is that it’s leading both the political and military responses to the M23, which were previously led by different actors. The M23 threat requires both a political and military response, and ensuring these two prongs remain closely integrated is essential. </p>
<p>So far, though, the M23 has not respected the timelines for withdrawal set as part of the political process, including the most recent <a href="https://ntrtv.com.tr/no-retreat-by-m23-rebels-from-eastern-drc-on-deadline/">30 March 2022 deadline</a>. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/east-african-troops-hope-to-bring-peace-in-the-drc-but-there-may-be-stumbling-blocks-195937">East African troops hope to bring peace in the DRC but there may be stumbling blocks</a>
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<p>This lack of progress has led Angolan president João Lourenço – who is <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/221187/rwanda-and-drc-start-peace-talks-mediated-by-angola/">mediating peace talks</a> between the DRC and Rwanda – to announce the deployment of 500 Angolan troops to the volatile east. Kinshasa said the Angolan troops would be there “<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/angola-deploy-troops-congos-rebel-hit-east-2023-03-17/#:%7E:text=LUANDA%2C%20March%2017%20(Reuters),approved%20the%20deployment%20on%20Friday.">not to attack but to help maintain peace</a>”. Sadly, there is not yet much peace to be maintained.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204036/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jenna Russo is the Director of Research for the International Peace Institute (IPI) and the Head of IPI's Brian Urquhart Center for Peace Operations. </span></em></p>The region’s forces are seen as important in addressing the long-running conflict in the DRC – but their involvement is complicated.Jenna Russo, Researcher and lecturer, City University of New YorkLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2037672023-04-18T12:19:39Z2023-04-18T12:19:39ZKenya should decriminalise homosexuality: 4 compelling reasons why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520830/original/file-20230413-14-r1pv5c.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Activists agitate for equal rights for all in Nairobi, Kenya, in January 2020. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Kenya has recently seen the <a href="https://kohljournal.press/health-and-freedom">increasing visibility</a> of sexual and gender minorities. However, this has been met with <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/3/15/how-an-lgbtq-court-ruling-sent-kenya-into-a-moral-panic">a growing backlash</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4uGzjZIzM8">Religious</a> and <a href="https://ntvkenya.co.ke/news/gachagua-on-lgbtq-those-are-satanic-beliefs/">political leaders</a> have been spreading homophobic and transphobic rhetoric. This has happened with the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/report/2015/09/28/issue-violence/attacks-lgbt-people-kenyas-coast">tacit approval</a> of a law enforcement apparatus that’s supposed to guarantee the right to equal protection. </p>
<p>The continued criminalisation of same-sex sexual relations among consenting adults in Kenya worsens social disparities and inequalities. It fuels socioeconomic and health vulnerabilities. </p>
<p>It <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/308163037_Freedom_Corner_Redefining_HIV_and_AIDS_care_and_support_among_men_who_have_sex_with_men_in_Nairobi_Kenya">deprives members of these minority groups</a> access to education, a livelihood, and basic services like housing and healthcare. Criminalisation pushes <a href="https://pure.uva.nl/ws/files/18012125/Thesis.pdf">sexual and gender minorities to the margins of society</a>. Research has shown that sexual and gender minorities are <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/308163037_Freedom_Corner_Redefining_HIV_and_AIDS_care_and_support_among_men_who_have_sex_with_men_in_Nairobi_Kenya">consistently targeted</a> for unfair dismissal from jobs or business opportunities. </p>
<p>The decriminalisation of same-sex relations among adults would lead to four positive outcomes: inclusive development for economic growth, improved health outcomes, the safety and security of sexual minorities, and an acceptance of diversity and equality. This view is based on our <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Emmy-Kageha">research on social exclusion</a>, with a focus on <a href="https://kohljournal.press/health-and-freedom">sexual and gender minorities</a>.</p>
<h2>Inclusive development for economic growth</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/region/afr/brief/social-inclusion-in-africa">Social inclusion</a> is the process of improving the conditions for individuals and groups to participate in society. Social exclusion based on sexual orientation leads to lower societal standing. </p>
<p>This often leads to poorer outcomes in terms of income, human capital endowments and access to employment. People who are discriminated against tend to lack a voice in national and local decision making. </p>
<p>Decriminalisation of same-sex sexual relations would help address institutionalised stigma and discrimination. It would enhance access to equal opportunities by eliminating barriers to employment and other livelihood opportunities.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lgbti-refugees-seeking-protection-in-kenya-struggle-to-survive-in-a-hostile-environment-182810">LGBTI refugees seeking protection in Kenya struggle to survive in a hostile environment</a>
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<p><a href="https://pure.uva.nl/ws/files/18012125/Thesis.pdf">Research</a> shows that sexual and gender minorities with access to income opportunities support their families financially. This is true even in cases where families aren’t accepting. People who are educated can also compete effectively in the job market. The exclusion of minorities, therefore, means <a href="https://open-for-business.org/kenya-economic-case">the loss of a workforce and their contribution to economic development</a>. </p>
<h2>Better health outcomes</h2>
<p>Social exclusion contributes to poor health among sexual and gender minorities. In 2020, <a href="https://www.unaids.org/sites/default/files/media_asset/2021-global-aids-update_en.pdf#page=6">1.5 million people</a> were newly infected with HIV. Those <a href="https://www.unaids.org/sites/default/files/media_asset/2021-global-aids-update_en.pdf#page=23">most vulnerable</a> to infection include people who inject drugs, transgender women, sex workers, men who have sex with men, and their sexual partners. </p>
<p>These key populations accounted for <a href="https://www.unaids.org/sites/default/files/media_asset/2021-global-aids-update_en.pdf#page=23">65% of HIV infections</a> globally. In sub-Saharan Africa, they accounted for <a href="https://www.unaids.org/sites/default/files/media_asset/2021-global-aids-update_en.pdf#page=24">39% of new infections</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://open-for-business.org/about">Open for Business</a> is a global research coalition that seeks to address the backlash against the LGBTIQ+ community. In a <a href="https://open-for-business.org/kenya-economic-case">2020 report</a>, the group estimated that discrimination against sexual minorities costs Kenya up to Sh105 billion (US$782 million) annually in poor health outcomes. </p>
<p>Decriminalisation enhances access to healthcare. <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17441692.2018.1462841">Our</a> <a href="https://kohljournal.press/health-and-freedom">research</a> shows, for example, better health such as decreased new HIV infections in societies that adopt laws that advance non-discrimination and decriminalise same-sex relationships. </p>
<h2>Enhancing safety and security</h2>
<p>In 2014, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights adopted <a href="https://achpr.au.int/en/adopted-resolutions/275-resolution-protection-against-violence-and-other-human-rights-violations">Resolution 275</a>. The resolution expresses grave concerns about increasing violence and other human rights violations – including murder, rape and assault – of individuals based on sexual orientation or gender identity. </p>
<p>Safety and security are some of the <a href="https://www.article19.org/resources/kenya-murder-lgbtq-activist-urgent-reform/">biggest challenges</a> facing sexual and gender minorities in Kenya. The country has seen an escalation of <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/3/15/how-an-lgbtq-court-ruling-sent-kenya-into-a-moral-panic">negative rhetoric and violence</a> targeting sexual and gender minorities, and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-64491276">related organisations</a>. Hate speech, verbal and physical abuse, sexual violence and police harassment <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/uganda-lgbt-hatecrime-idUSL4N3584J1">have increased</a>. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/justiceforsheila-highlights-the-precarious-lives-of-queer-people-in-kenya-183102">#JusticeForSheila highlights the precarious lives of queer people in Kenya</a>
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<p>In Kenya’s coastal city of Mombasa, for instance, sexual minorities <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-03-16-gay-people-fear-for-their-lives-escape-mombasa-over-planned-demos/">fled</a> recent <a href="https://twitter.com/citizentvkenya/status/1636702221743079425?s=20">homophobic street protests</a>. A <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/334681176_Are_we_doing_alright_Realities_of_violence_mental_health_and_access_to_healthcare_related_to_sexual_orientation_and_gender_identity_and_expression_in_East_and_Southern_Africa_Research_report_based_on_">2019 report</a> on the experiences of the <a href="https://ccprcentre.org/files/documents/INT_CCPR_CSS_KEN_44420_E.pdf#page=6">LGBTIQ+ community in Kenya</a> found that 53% have been physically assaulted and 44% sexually assaulted. </p>
<p>The criminalisation of same-sex sexual relations among adults contributes to a climate of violence and discrimination. Moreover, criminalisation supports the perpetrators of violence who take the law into their own hands. </p>
<h2>Acceptance of diversity</h2>
<p>Sexual and gender minorities are socially excluded because of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/homosexuality-remains-illegal-in-kenya-as-court-rejects-lgbt-petition-112149">criminal label</a> the law imposes on them. This affects their self-acceptance and mental health. </p>
<p>Homophobic acts are widespread even in countries where <a href="https://theconversation.com/sam-smith-how-queerphobia-and-fatphobia-intersect-in-the-backlash-to-the-im-not-here-to-make-friends-video-199437">same-sex relations are legal</a>. However, decriminalisation helps facilitate some level of acceptance among minority groups and within wider society. </p>
<p><a href="https://ualr.edu/socialchange/2013/01/13/impact-of-the-decriminalization-of-homosexuality-in-delhi-an-empirical-study">Studies</a> <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9293432/">have found</a> that decriminalisation reduces societal violence. </p>
<h2>The way forward</h2>
<p>Same-sex relations, or sexual and gender minorities, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/43904926">aren’t new</a> <a href="https://www.arcados.ch/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/MURRAY-ROSCOE-BOY-WIVES-FEMALE-HUSBANDS-98.pdf">in Africa</a>. They aren’t a <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332192031_An_Exploratory_Journey_of_Cultural_Visual_Literacy_of_Non-Conforming_Gender_Representations_from_Pre-Colonial_Sub-_Saharan_Africa">foreign ideology</a>. </p>
<p>Social exclusion constitutes perhaps the most serious challenge towards attaining sustainable and inclusive development. The criminalisation of same-sex relations among consenting adults in Kenya’s penal code exposes the weaknesses of the constitution in ensuring inclusivity. The law must, therefore, be changed. </p>
<p>Repealing criminalisation clauses is an important step toward reducing stigma, violence and discrimination. It would certainly open a new chapter in the lives of sexual and gender minorities.</p>
<p>There’s also an urgent need to make sexual and gender minorities visible. Awareness campaigns can help debunk perceptions that they are “anti-religious” or “un-African”. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-does-the-bible-say-about-homosexuality-for-starters-jesus-wasnt-a-homophobe-199424">What does the Bible say about homosexuality? For starters, Jesus wasn't a homophobe</a>
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<p>There’s an equally urgent need to identify all forms of discrimination against sexual and gender minorities under domestic and international laws. This will help address the root causes of inequalities.</p>
<p>Decriminalisation of same-sex relations is imperative. It will help address widening disparities, inequalities in society and the gaps in social integration.</p>
<p><em>Nicholas Etyang, a senior policy advocacy officer at the African Population and Health Research Center, is a co-author of this article.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203767/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lucy Wanjiku Mung’ala is affiliated with Hivos, where she works as the strategy and impact lead - gender equality, diversity and inclusion. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emmy Kageha Igonya does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The criminalisation of same-sex sexual relations among consenting adults in Kenya worsens social disparities and inequalities.Emmy Kageha Igonya, Associate research scientist, African Population and Health Research CenterLucy Wanjiku Mung’ala, PhD Researcher, University of AmsterdamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2035802023-04-16T07:18:52Z2023-04-16T07:18:52ZFrom advertising blackmail to physical threats, Kenya’s journalists are under attack – but they must also regain public trust<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520468/original/file-20230412-16-78wq4n.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Journalists take cover during March 2023 protests in Kenya. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Boniface Muthoni/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>In recent months, Kenyan journalists have been <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/blogs-opinion/editorials/stop-this-unwarranted-affront-to-media-freedom-4167720">harassed</a>, <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/blogs-opinion/editorials/denounce-this-blatant-attempt-to-muzzle-media-4170448">intimidated</a> and <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/journalists-attacked-as-anti-government-protests-continue-in-kenya-/7030753.html">attacked</a> by government officials, politicians and members of the public. George Ogola, a professor of media industries, explains the impact of these attacks on media freedom in Kenya.</em> </p>
<h2>What are the major emerging threats against media freedom in Kenya?</h2>
<p>Kenya’s media face threats from both state and non-state actors as <a href="https://theconversation.com/moi-and-the-media-how-kenyan-journalism-suffered-under-his-iron-heel-131681">repressive practices of the past</a> reemerge. Government and opposition politicians are actively undermining media freedom in the country. This isn’t entirely new. But the threats have taken a new dimension as they are publicly defended – even boldly justified – by some of the perpetrators. These threats are economic, political and physical.</p>
<p><strong>Economic squeeze.</strong> In what it claimed was a measure of austerity to curb government spending – but which was interpreted as a deliberate attempt to muzzle media criticism – the previous government established a media buying agency, the <a href="https://ict.go.ke/directorate-of-government-advertising-agency-gaa/">Government Advertising Agency</a>. All government advertising is now channelled through this agency. </p>
<p>Critical media were and are now regularly “punished” through the <a href="https://rsf.org/en/government-orders-state-sector-withdraw-advertising-standard-group-media">withdrawal of government advertising</a>. In the run-up to the August 2022 elections, one of President William Ruto’s senior policy men <a href="https://twitter.com/DavidNdii/status/1552249429406744576?s=20">warned the media</a> that they were best advised to look for advertising elsewhere as it would not be business as usual with state advertising.</p>
<p><strong>Political threats.</strong> The <a href="https://theconversation.com/william-ruto-vs-kenyas-media-democracy-is-at-stake-190780">emerging systematic media repression</a> has also taken the form of brazen political threats from within the senior ranks of government. In what seemed like a well-calibrated attack by the ruling coalition, several politicians accused the media of being a “<a href="https://twitter.com/Aaroncheruiyot/status/1632672857040846850?s=20">cartel</a>” which needed to be “crushed”. These alarming sentiments were <a href="https://twitter.com/KIMANIICHUNGWAH/status/1633125734473674752?s=20">shared by the ruling party’s majority leader</a> in parliament. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/william-ruto-vs-kenyas-media-democracy-is-at-stake-190780">William Ruto vs Kenya's media: democracy is at stake</a>
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<p>More draconian threats have included alleged plans to shut down media houses and the internet. Against the background of <a href="https://theconversation.com/mass-protests-in-kenya-have-a-long-and-rich-history-but-have-been-hijacked-by-the-elites-202979">opposition protests</a> in the country in March 2023, the Kenya Media Sector Working Group claimed the government had intended to <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/journalists-call-out-govt-over-alleged-plan-to-shut-internet-media-over-azimio-protests-4182216">shut down the broadcast media and the internet</a> ahead of a planned demonstration. The president <a href="https://ntvkenya.co.ke/news/ruto-on-plan-to-shut-down-mainstream-media-internet/">denied such plans</a>.
Meanwhile, opposition leader Raila Odinga called on his supporters to <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-03-21-uproar-over-railas-call-for-boycott-of-the-star/">boycott the Star newspaper</a>, a local daily, accusing it of bias. Even though he later withdrew the order, the disregard for the principles of media freedom was apparent.</p>
<p><strong>Physical assaults.</strong> In what seemed like a return to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/daniel-arap-moi-the-making-of-a-kenyan-big-man-127177">repressive 1980s</a> during Kenya’s struggle for political pluralism, journalists were physically assaulted by the police and demonstrators in recent mass protests. Incredibly, the inspector general of police described the risk of assault as part of journalism’s “<a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-04-04-it-wasnt-deliberate-koome-tells-media-over-attacks-during-demos/">occupational hazards</a>”. </p>
<h2>What does the law say about media freedom?</h2>
<p>Kenya has a relatively strong legal framework that supports media freedom. This is in addition to instruments like charters, treaties and declarations. </p>
<p>The freedom and independence of all types of media are guaranteed by <a href="https://klrc.go.ke/index.php/constitution-of-kenya/112-chapter-four-the-bill-of-rights/part-2-rights-and-fundamental-freedoms/200-34-freedom-of-the-media">Article 34 of the constitution</a>. <a href="https://klrc.go.ke/index.php/constitution-of-kenya/112-chapter-four-the-bill-of-rights/part-2-rights-and-fundamental-freedoms/199-33-freedom-of-expression">Articles 33</a> and <a href="https://klrc.go.ke/index.php/constitution-of-kenya/112-chapter-four-the-bill-of-rights/part-2-rights-and-fundamental-freedoms/201-35-access-to-information">35</a> further guarantee freedom of expression and access to information, respectively. </p>
<p>Additional legislation includes the <a href="https://mediacouncil.or.ke/sites/default/files/downloads/media-act-2013.pdf">Media Council of Kenya Act (2013)</a>, which established the Media Council of Kenya. The council promotes and protects the freedom and independence of the media. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://kenyalaw.org/kl/fileadmin/pdfdownloads/AmendmentActs/2013/KenyaInformationandCommunications_Amendment_Act2013.pdf">Kenya Information and Communication (Amendment) Act (2013)</a> established the Communications Authority of Kenya. It licences and regulates postal, information and communications services. The act gives the authority “independence from government, political or commercial interests”.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.eala.org/uploads/The_Treaty_for_the_Establishment_of_the_East_Africa_Community_2006_1999.pdf">East African Community treaty (1999)</a>, <a href="https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights#:%7E:text=Article%2019,media%20and%20regardless%20of%20frontiers">Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights</a> and the African Union’s <a href="http://hrlibrary.umn.edu/achpr/expressionfreedomdec.html">Declaration of Principles on Human Rights in Africa (2002)</a>, all ratified by Kenya, advocate for media freedom. </p>
<p>Other key advocates for media freedom include the Kenya Union of Journalists, the Kenya Editors Guild and the Media Owners Association. </p>
<h2>Are media outlets free of blame?</h2>
<p>There is a growing public wariness about the performance of the media, which are increasingly being accused of partisanship and poor journalism. </p>
<p>The Kenyan media have always been embedded within the broader contests for political power forced upon them by <a href="https://internews.org/wp-content/uploads/legacy/resources/Internews_FactuallyTrue_Legally_Untrue-MediaOwnership_Kenya2013-01.pdf">media ownership structures</a>. Journalists are also wedded to Kenya’s polarising, ethnically inflected politics. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-kenyatta-has-gone-about-stifling-the-free-press-in-kenya-91335">How Kenyatta has gone about stifling the free press in Kenya</a>
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<p>A study of the structural conditions of journalism in Kenya describes the media culture as one that “<a href="http://www.mecodem.eu/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Lohner-Banjac-Neverla-2016_Mapping-structural-conditions-of-journalism-in-Kenya.pdf#page=5">fluctuates from critical to concordant, clientelist reporting</a>”. Coverage can reflect the ethnic loyalties of the writers or media houses. This has eroded public trust in sections of the media. </p>
<p>Further, the media licensing regime has traditionally been transactional. Political support is rewarded with licences and access to state advertising. </p>
<p>Importantly, too, as economic challenges become existential threats to many media organisations, they have been forced to reduce their workforce, weakening gate-keeping processes. </p>
<p>These organisations also have to contend with the speed of social media as competitors. As the focus shifts to speed, quality is undermined. </p>
<p>The professional precarity of journalists afraid to lose their jobs has also made them susceptible to self-censorship and bribery. </p>
<h2>What are the options for the media?</h2>
<p>Continued exposure to advertising blackmail from the government weakens the media’s ability to operate independently. It is, therefore, critical that Kenya’s media find ways of diversifying their revenue streams. </p>
<p>Media organisations must continue to raise awareness about the importance of media freedom. They must push back against attempts to undermine their independence and encroach on their freedoms. </p>
<p>There are also enduring legal threats, such as the misapplication of laws like the <a href="http://kenyalaw.org/kl/fileadmin/pdfdownloads/Acts/ComputerMisuseandCybercrimesActNo5of2018.pdf">Computer Misuse and Cybercrimes Act</a>, which criminalises the publication of false information. Such laws are routinely abused and must, therefore, be fought. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/social-media-is-being-misused-in-kenyas-political-arena-why-its-hard-to-stop-it-177586">Social media is being misused in Kenya's political arena. Why it's hard to stop it</a>
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<p>Lastly, the media must continue investing in training and capacity building for journalists. The allure of speed in an attempt to compete with social media may be tempting, but it risks undermining ethical reporting, fact-checking and quality journalism.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203580/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>George Ogola does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There is a growing public wariness about the performance of the media, which are increasingly accused of being partisan.George Ogola, Professor of Media Industries, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2029792023-04-03T13:57:28Z2023-04-03T13:57:28ZMass protests in Kenya have a long and rich history – but have been hijacked by the elites<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518491/original/file-20230330-20-zjju3k.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Protesters face off with an anti-riot police officer in Nairobi, Kenya, in March 2023. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga and his coalition party, Azimio la Umoja-One Kenya, recently called for <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/292123/kenya-raila-announces-anti-ruto-protests-with-major-demo-in-nairobi/">mass protests across the country</a>. Odinga and his team have questioned the legitimacy of President William Ruto’s win in the country’s August 2022 election, and taken issue with the rising cost of living. The Conversation Africa’s Kagure Gacheche spoke with Westen K Shilaho, a senior researcher on African politics, who explores the evolution of political protests in Kenya.</em></p>
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<h2>What does the law say about political protest?</h2>
<p>The right to protest is enshrined in the <a href="https://www.klrc.go.ke/index.php/constitution-of-kenya/112-chapter-four-the-bill-of-rights/part-2-rights-and-fundamental-freedoms/203-37-assembly-demonstration-picketing-and-petition#:%7E:text=Assembly%2C%20demonstration%2C%20picketing%20and%20petition,-Chapter%20Four%20%2D%20The&text=Every%20person%20has%20the%20right,present%20petitions%20to%20public%20authorities.">constitution of Kenya under Article 37</a>. It states that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Every person has the right, peaceably and unarmed, to assemble, to demonstrate, to picket, and to present petitions to public authorities.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The right to protest is also affirmed by international instruments to which Kenya is a signatory. These include the <a href="https://au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/36390-treaty-0011_-_african_charter_on_human_and_peoples_rights_e.pdf">African Charter on Human and People’s Rights</a> and the <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/international-covenant-civil-and-political-rights">International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights</a>. </p>
<p>However, successive Kenyan governments have repeatedly criminalised the right to protest. As a result, the police consistently react with <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/au-calls-for-calm-restraint-in-kenya-4175774">brute force against protesters</a>. </p>
<h2>What led to the latest wave of protests in Kenya?</h2>
<p>Kenya held general elections on 9 August 2022, and <a href="https://www.iebc.or.ke/uploads/resources/nJbSsSKxMj.pdf">William Ruto was declared president</a>. The opposition contested the election results and <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/raila-contests-presidential-election-results-supreme-court-3922660">filed a petition</a> before the supreme court, which <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/kenyan-court-to-rule-on-disputed-presidential-election-/6731434.html">unanimously dismissed the petition</a> for lack of evidence. </p>
<p>Raila Odinga, the losing presidential contestant, rejected this ruling and has refused to recognise Ruto’s win. He has taken the dispute to the court of public opinion – the streets. He has made three main demands: </p>
<ul>
<li><p>that the electoral agency’s servers be opened to prove that he won the 2022 election</p></li>
<li><p>that Ruto halts <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/25-kenyans-seek-to-replace-chebukati-as-iebc-chair-895-eye-commissioner-jobs-4177314">reconstitution of Kenya’s electoral body</a> </p></li>
<li><p>that the government lowers the cost of living.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>Protests began on 15 August 2022 when the presidential election results were declared. <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/entertainment/national/article/2001453334/bitter-end-chebukati-attacked-as-chaos-mar-bomas-briefing">Hoodlums assaulted</a> the electoral agency’s chairperson and other officials. They are yet to be held to account for these attacks.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-body-choosing-kenyas-election-commission-is-being-overhauled-how-this-could-strengthen-democracy-198798">The body choosing Kenya's election commission is being overhauled – how this could strengthen democracy</a>
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<p>After a six-month lull, these protests recently spilled over onto the streets. The opposition called for demonstrations <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/raila-odinga-calls-for-boycott-of-safaricom-kcb-4167328">twice a week</a> from 20 March until the government accedes to its demands. </p>
<p>Ruto and his supporters <a href="https://www.capitalfm.co.ke/news/2023/03/president-ruto-dismisses-raila-call-for-resignation-halt-of-iebc-recruitment/">have been scornful</a> of the opposition’s demands, saying they have no basis in <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/president-ruto-dismisses-raila-s-azimio-protests-as-sabotage--4103666">law, morality or logic</a>. Ruto dismissed the protests as <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2023-03-19-i-will-not-allow-you-to-terrorise-kenyans-ruto-tells-raila/">acts of economic terrorism</a>. </p>
<p>After two weeks of <a href="https://www.africanews.com/2023/03/30/violent-clashes-as-kenya-opposition-stages-third-day-of-protests/">violence</a> – where at least three people died, several others injured and property vandalised – Ruto extended an olive branch to the opposition and asked them to <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/eyes-on-raila-as-ruto-asks-opposition-to-call-off-protests-4182346">call off the protests</a>. He suggested that the issue of the reconstitution of the electoral body could be revisited. </p>
<p>In response, <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-04-02-my-door-is-open-for-talks-call-off-protests-ruto-tells-raila/">the opposition suspended the protests</a>. </p>
<p>Ruto has previously said he would not be <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/anxiety-as-ruto-raila-harden-stance-over-protests-4172706">blackmailed into a power-sharing arrangement</a> with the opposition. If not checked, power-sharing arrangements – or “<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyatta-raila-pact-will-only-herald-real-change-if-promises-are-followed-by-action-96148">handshake</a>” in Kenya’s political parlance – could become the country’s default arrangement after elections. This would be to the detriment of democratic tenets. </p>
<h2>What is the history of political protests in Kenya?</h2>
<p>Kenya’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-kenyas-constitutional-duels-are-all-about-power-struggles-among-the-elite-147471">political history</a> is marked by mass protests that date back to the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/180739">colonial period</a> and continued into independence. </p>
<p>Amid police crackdowns, Kenyans protested against <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000096439/witness-recalls-the-1969-kisumu-massacre-that-marked-jomo-kenyatta-s-visit">political assassinations</a> and autocracy during the tenures of the country’s first president, Jomo Kenyatta, and his successor, Daniel Moi. </p>
<p>Through a <a href="http://kenyalaw.org/kl/fileadmin/pdfdownloads/Constitution/HistoryoftheConstitutionofKenya/Acts/1982/ActNo.7of1982.pdf">constitutional amendment</a>, Moi turned Kenya into a one-party state in 1982, which heightened political tensions. Later that year, Kenyans protested in Nairobi in support of an <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/kenya/article/2001380803/inside-secret-coup-attempt-that-killed-240-in-city-crossfire">attempted coup against Moi</a> as opposition politicians and civil society sought a return to political pluralism. </p>
<p>Countrywide protests were held in <a href="https://www.theelephant.info/features/2020/07/07/saba-saba-and-the-evolution-of-citizen-power">1990</a>. This agitation, coupled with pressure from civil society, religious groups and western donors, forced Moi to accede to <a href="https://www.csmonitor.com/1991/1204/04041.html">multiparty politics in 1991</a>. </p>
<p>In 1992, <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/entertainment/news/article/2001261426/bare-breasted-crusade-when-mothers-of-political-prisoners-stripped-at-uhuru-park">mothers of political prisoners</a> held an 11-month hunger strike in Nairobi to demand the release of their sons. </p>
<p>Protests against presidential results in 2007 led to a <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2013/3/3/kenya-what-went-wrong-in-2007">horrific crackdown</a>. More than 1,100 people were killed, <a href="https://digitalcommons.law.seattleu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1004&context=tjrc-gov">several of them extrajudicially</a> by the police. Odinga had disputed Mwai Kibaki’s win. Protests and summary executions also followed the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/mar/17/kenya-riot-police-election-protest">2013</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-history-of-political-violence-colonialism-vigilantes-and-militias-83888">2017</a> announcements of presidential election results.</p>
<p>Protests are important. They can influence a government or a body of authority to respond to popular interests and injustice. Through protests, a government can be forced to address service delivery concerns, corruption, labour disputes, extrajudicial and summary executions and education matters, and to abandon dictatorial tendencies. In some countries, such as <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Arab-Spring">Tunisia, Egypt and Libya</a>, protests collapsed regimes. </p>
<p>As I discuss in my book, <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322174201_Political_Power_and_Tribalism_in_Kenya">Political Power and Tribalism in Kenya</a>, political protests in the country have become insular, sectarian, tribal, unashamedly personality driven and elitist. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-history-of-political-violence-colonialism-vigilantes-and-militias-83888">Kenya’s history of political violence: colonialism, vigilantes and militias</a>
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<p>My research found that the political elite have used protests for self-preservation and to pursue their interests. Protests have become about getting opposing political personalities to come to an agreement so that election losers don’t lose all the benefits of being in power – but such agreements stifle healthy debate.</p>
<p>Elections must produce winners and losers among the contestants. The citizenry should be the only constant winners. Their concerns must be met regardless of who ascends to power.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/202979/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Westen K Shilaho does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Political protests in Kenya have become insular, sectarian, tribal and unashamedly personality driven.Westen K Shilaho, Senior Research Fellow, Institute for PanAfrican Thought and Conversation (IPATC), University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1990102023-02-08T14:28:18Z2023-02-08T14:28:18ZKenya’s president wants taxes to replace foreign debt – seven ways to get there<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507825/original/file-20230202-21-1mdptm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There are fears that Kenya's debt has been funding mostly government salaries.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/kenyas-cabinet-secretary-for-national-treasury-henry-rotich-news-photo/974392922?phrase=national%20treasury%20kenya&adppopup=true">Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the run-up to Kenya’s 2022 polls, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THIygUIpS9w">economic issues</a>, particularly public debt and joblessness, took centre stage. The Kenya Kwanza team led by William Ruto suggested that Kenya had over-borrowed, a habit they pledged to stop. Ruto’s rivals <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/uhuru-defends-jubilee-s-sh6-7-trillion-debt-spree-3835802">defended</a> the debt, insisting investment in infrastructure would spur economic growth. </p>
<p>Kenya’s <a href="https://www.treasury.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Medium-Term-Debt-Management-Strategy-2023.pdf#page=24">nominal debt</a> stood at KSh9.14 trillion or US$74.1 billion by the end of December 2022. That accounted for 67% of the GDP. More than half of the debt, 51% (US$37.87 billion) was owed to foreign entities. A debt limit of no more than 64% of the national GDP is <a href="https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/509771468337915456/pdf/WPS5391.pdf">recommended</a> for developing countries such as Kenya.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-has-breached-its-public-debt-ceiling-how-it-got-there-and-what-that-means-190006">Kenya has breached its public debt ceiling – how it got there and what that means</a>
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<p>Global institutions like the <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-19/imf-approves-447-million-for-kenya-to-address-debt-reforms?leadSource=uverify%20wall">International Monetary Fund</a> and the World Bank are concerned about Kenya’s debt sustainability. </p>
<p>Aside from the sheer amount being borrowed, there are fears that the debt has been funding <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/business/state-uses-sh162bn-loan-illegally-on-salaries-utilities-3950530">recurrent expenditure</a>, mostly government salaries. It’s true, though, that big projects like the <a href="https://theconversation.com/mombasa-port-how-kenyas-auditor-general-misread-chinas-standard-gauge-railway-contracts-182610">standard gauge railway</a> and the <a href="https://theconversation.com/nairobis-new-expressway-may-ease-traffic-woes-but-mostly-for-the-wealthy-170164">expressway</a> have been partly funded by debt.</p>
<p>Debt politics has further been fuelled by the <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/belt-road-colonialism-chinese-characteristics">narrative</a> that by saddling Africa with debt, China is able to call the shots on trade, investment and even geopolitical issues. </p>
<p>Ruto is now in power and seems determined to reduce public debt. The government still has to rely on domestic and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/imf-approves-disbursement-44739-million-%20kenya-2022-12-20/">foreign</a> borrowing, but Ruto wants to reduce it. He intends to do that by <a href="https://www.africanews.com/2022/09/30/kenya-president-ruto-wants-to-reform-tax-system-to-reduce-inequality//">collecting more taxes</a> and using <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/business/article/2001460511/ruto-talks-tough-on-debt-eyes-pensioners-savings-to-fund-projects">national savings</a> to pay for what the country needs. </p>
<p>The Kenya Revenue Authority has been given new <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/business/president-ruto-s-tax-targets-leave-kra-in-a-pot-4077264">revenue targets</a> – US$10 billion more to raise in one year, an almost 50% increase. It is expected to double current collections in five years to US$48 billion by 2027, an election year.</p>
<p>The targets seem too ambitious under the current socio-economic circumstances. In trying to achieve the target, the formal sector is likely to be the hardest hit as its revenues are public and hard to hide. Higher taxes could depress demand too, leading to lower tax revenues and job losses. </p>
<h2>What should be done</h2>
<p>But increased tax collections could benefit everyone if the taxes are put to good use. Here are seven ways Ruto’s government can raise tax collection and cut reliance on foreign debt:</p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>Focus on economic growth</strong> – Tax is charged on income or profit. To meet the target, Ruto should focus on accelerating economic growth. That is how former president Mwai Kibaki – who raised GDP growth to 7% – managed to <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/business/article/2000049257/president-kibaki-s-economic-legacy">triple</a> tax revenues, from US$2 billion in 2002 to US$6 billion by 2011. </p>
<p>Of late, economic growth has been lower than expected, and is <a href="https://www.afdb.org/en/countries-east-africa-kenya/kenya-economic-outlook">projected</a> to slow from 5.9% in 2022 to 5.7% in 2023. </p>
<p>The economy grows when we invest or consume more. Ruto should make Kenya a more investment-friendly country by looking at business regulations and laws.
Higher taxes eat into investors’ profits and could discourage investment. Kenyan entrepreneurs should be able to start businesses without worrying about the taxman <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/corporate/companies/kra-in-fresh-bid-to-shut-down-keroche-breweries-3885398">closing</a> their premises. </p>
<p>What encourages economic growth is offering quality goods and services that are globally competitive. The economy should reward innovators and those who go the extra mile. Providing services like roads, sewers, power and security will attract investors. Giving citizens confidence creates demand and economic growth. </p>
<p>Once the economy grows, tax revenue grows, whether it’s value added tax or income tax. So, before setting a tax revenue target, Kenya should start with an economic growth target like the 10% rate envisaged in Kibaki’s <a href="https://vision2030.go.ke/">Vision 2030</a>. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>Choose optimal tax rates</strong> – The government should pick tax rates that yield maximum tax revenue. <a href="https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/wealth/tax/here-is-everything-you-want-to-know-about-laffer-curve-and-tax/tomorrowmakersshow/51098997.cms">Theory</a> has it that high tax rates can produce lower tax revenues. High tax rates could lead to inflation as entrepreneurs load the extra charge onto prices. That could lead to lower demand for goods and services, and depress tax revenues.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Share the burden</strong> – Have more people pay taxes. That includes the informal sector. If citizens can see how taxes are working for them, they will be <a href="https://theconversation.com/uganda-study-shows-text-messages-can-boost-tax-compliance-heres-what-worked-177522">encouraged</a> to pay. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>Eliminate tax exemptions</strong> – There is no need for tax exemptions for investors or firms just because they can lobby the government. Progressive tax rates (high rates for top earners and low ones for smaller incomes) can do all the magic. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>Address corruption</strong> – About a third of Kenya’s budget is lost through <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-corruption-idUSKCN0WC1H8">corruption</a>, and former president Uhuru Kenyatta <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/president-kenyatta-says-over-ksh-2-billion-is-stolen-from-govt-daily-4563455">alluded</a> to this. </p></li>
<li><p><strong>Boost national savings</strong> – Higher savings would reduce interest rates on treasury bonds and bills. Since banks and other institutions would be awash with cash, the government would not need to raise rates to attract investment in government paper. Savings would make credit available to the private sector too, leading to lower interest rates and more borrowing, which is an economic stimulus. The national savings level for <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/business/kenya/2021-07-25-kenyans-saving-culture-poorest-in-east-africa--survey/">Kenya</a> is currently low. The government should craft a <a href="https://ifs.org.uk/articles/how-can-policymakers-raise-household-saving">policy</a> to help boost savings among households.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Cede roles to philanthropy</strong> – Many services being provided by the government could be ceded to philanthropists. Examples include mission hospitals and schools. That would reduce the need for tax revenues. The government should come up with an incentive framework for philanthropists. Additionally, some services currently offered by the government can be offered through the private sector more cheaply and efficiently. </p></li>
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<p>Collecting more tax should be coupled with prudent government spending. That has political implications; it could lead to <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/sh300bn-budget-cuts-await-css-3967308">job losses</a> in the public sector, but create efficiency – which is good for the economy in the long run.</p>
<p><em>Since the article was first published, data on Kenya’s debt statistics in the second paragraph has been updated.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/199010/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>XN Iraki does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>William Ruto is determined to reduce public debt by collecting more taxes to pay for what the country needs.XN Iraki, Associate Professor, Faculty of Business and Management Sciences, University of NairobiLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1987982023-02-02T06:48:39Z2023-02-02T06:48:39ZThe body choosing Kenya’s election commission is being overhauled – how this could strengthen democracy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507316/original/file-20230131-4114-8kr9t0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">William Ruto (right) takes over from Uhuru Kenyatta as Kenya's president in 2022. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Kenya has new rules for choosing the people who run its elections.</p>
<p>President William Ruto has signed into law the <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/index.php/iebc-amendment-bill-2022-assented-law">Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (Amendment) Bill</a>. It changes the composition of the panel that selects people to serve on the country’s Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.iebc.or.ke/iebc/?mandate">commission</a> is a state institution that has the task of enhancing and supporting constitutional democracy in Kenya. It conducts elections, registers citizens as voters and maintains the voters’ roll. It also fixes the boundaries of electoral constituencies and wards. It settles electoral disputes, registers candidates for election and conducts voter education.</p>
<p>But since it was established in 2011, the commission has been at the centre of Kenya’s history of post-election violence. </p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/counties/article/2000203367/the-truth-lies-and-dangers-as-debate-on-iebc-rages-on">2013</a>, <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20171018-kenya-election-chief-doubt-free-fair-poll-kenyatta-odinga-demonstrations">2017</a> and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/rigging-allegations-begin-kenyan-media-slow-tally-votes-tight-presidential-race-2022-08-12/">2022</a>, the losing political parties accused it of failing to administer elections fairly and lawfully. </p>
<p>In 2017, the Kenyan supreme court accused the commission of “<a href="https://www.zawya.com/en/economy/africa/kenyans-usher-in-year-of-political-reforms-i46ulluz">bungling</a>” the presidential election. In the 2022 elections, the then vice-chairperson of the commission, Juliana Cherera, <a href="https://www.pd.co.ke/august-9/4-iebc-commissioners-disown-presidential-results-144903/">disowned the results</a> of the presidential poll before the official announcement. </p>
<p><a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/-raila-calls-for-constitutional-changes-and-iebc-reforms--4001430">Raila Odinga</a>, who lost that poll, called for reforms that would make the electoral commission a much fairer referee of the country’s elections. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/raila-odinga-should-be-thanked-his-election-losses-helped-deepen-kenyas-democracy-190044">Raila Odinga should be thanked - his election losses helped deepen Kenya's democracy</a>
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<p>The new law seeks to <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/sites/default/files/2022-11/Independent%20Electoral%20and%20Boundaries%20Commission%20%28Amendment%29%20Bill%2C%202022.pdf">streamline the process</a> of appointing members to the electoral commission, making the selection process more participatory and reflective of the country’s diversity.</p>
<p>And it comes at a critical moment. Seven commissioner positions are currently vacant.</p>
<p>A weak electoral agency poses four major threats to Kenya’s democracy: it will fail to deliver fair, free and credible elections; it will disrupt improvements in the country’s transition to democracy; it will prolong the culture of post-election violence; and it will divide the nation’s diverse ethnocultural groups.</p>
<p>It is, therefore, vital that the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission be a strong and fully functioning organisation staffed by Kenyans who are dedicated to democratic governance. </p>
<h2>What’s changing under the new law</h2>
<p>Selecting electoral commissioners is a complex job. </p>
<p>The new law brings more independent commissioners and associations into the selection process. Previously, only three agencies nominated the seven commissioners: the <a href="http://www.parliament.go.ke/psc/the-commission">Parliamentary Service Commission</a>, the <a href="https://interreligiouscouncil.or.ke/history/">Inter-Religious Council of Kenya</a> and the <a href="https://twitter.com/lawsocietykenya?lang=en">Law Society of Kenya</a>. Now there are five. The newcomers are the <a href="https://orpp.or.ke/index.php/services/political-parties-liaison-committees-pplc">Political Parties Liaison Committee</a> and the <a href="https://www.publicservice.go.ke/index.php/about-us/mandate">Public Service Commission</a>. They open the door for political parties and the public service to participate in this critical process.</p>
<p>It’s important that the selection panel includes state and non-state organisations that promote election integrity. Only individuals who are citizens of Kenya and meet the integrity requirements in <a href="http://www.kenyalaw.org:8181/exist/kenyalex/actview.xql?actid=Const2010#KE/CON/Const2010/chap_6">Chapter 6</a> of the constitution can serve on the selection panel. These individuals must hold a degree from a university recognised in Kenya.</p>
<h2>The vacancies</h2>
<p>Three of the current vacancies in the commission were expected: these commissioners’ terms had expired. But four other commissioners quit under a cloud of suspicion. </p>
<p>Cherera, Justus Nyang'aya and Francis Wanderi resigned after being <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2022-12-06-cherera-four-should-be-probed-even-after-resigning-mp-kiarie/">suspended for their conduct</a> during the 2022 election. They had alleged that commission chairperson Wafula Chebukati had <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/national/article/2001462824/cherera-nyangaya-wanderi-and-masit-to-be-investigated-individually-muchelule-says">altered poll results</a> in favour of Ruto. Another commissioner, Irene Masit, was also suspended. She now has <a href="https://www.citizen.digital/news/irene-masit-breaks-silence-after-skipping-hearings-by-tribunal-probing-cherera-4-n311525">charges pending</a> against her before a tribunal investigating the matter.</p>
<h2>Why elections matter</h2>
<p>Elections are <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/africa-in-focus/2020/10/30/threats-to-democracy-in-africa-the-rise-of-the-constitutional-coup/">a cornerstone of any democracy</a>. They help a nation build and sustain democratic and development-enhancing institutions. </p>
<p>They are a check on government. Elections put the power in ordinary people’s hands to change their government and choose more effective leaders for public service. They also give historically marginalised groups a voice.</p>
<p>To perform these functions, elections must meet certain minimum standards. They must be regular, fair, free, competitive, inclusive, transparent and credible. They must be conducted in strict conformity with the constitution. </p>
<p>That’s why a strong, independent and functioning electoral agency is so vital. </p>
<h2>Risks of dysfunction</h2>
<p>In Kenya, a weak and dysfunctional electoral commission would have dire consequences.</p>
<p>First, the failure to conduct elections that are considered by the majority of Kenyans as free, fair and credible could lead to the type of violence that the country experienced after the <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2013/3/3/kenya-what-went-wrong-in-2007">2007 presidential election</a>. More than 1,000 people died. </p>
<p>Second, a weak commission can derail improvements in Kenya’s electoral system. A strong commission sets codes of conduct for candidates and political parties. This helps guard against various forms of political opportunism, including corruption. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/fears-of-election-rigging-may-fuel-further-abuses-in-kenya-democracy-could-be-the-loser-176113">Fears of election rigging may fuel further abuses in Kenya: democracy could be the loser</a>
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<p>Third, a dysfunctional electoral commission can be manipulated by politicians and their supporters to monopolise political spaces. This situation has played out in <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/a-13-2007-07-23-voa7-66781532/565192.html">Cameroon</a>, where the ruling party has marginalised the opposition to remain in power since 1990. Similarly, in <a href="https://www.rfi.fr/en/africa/20200224-togo-incumbent-re-elected-fourth-term-opposition-alleges-fraud">Togo</a>, President Faure Gnassingbé has monopolised political spaces since 2005. </p>
<p>Fourth, in Kenya, the electoral commission is responsible for creating electoral boundaries. Any weakness in the commission can be exploited to create boundaries that benefit certain politicians and their supporters. This would undermine democracy and create distrust in the country’s democratic institutions.</p>
<p>The new law <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/politics/senators-split-on-proposal-to-change-law-on-iebc-selection-4090866">doesn’t meet the expectations</a> of all of Kenya’s political constituencies – some individuals and groups believe that their voice in the selection panel has been diluted. However, it’s important for all Kenyans to recognise these reforms as an effort in the right direction – towards a stronger and more inclusive commission.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198798/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Mukum Mbaku does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Kenya’s electoral agency is tasked with enhancing and supporting constitutional democracy – any dysfunctions would have dire consequences.John Mukum Mbaku, Professor, Weber State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1972022023-01-18T13:22:36Z2023-01-18T13:22:36ZKenya’s school reform is entering a new phase in 2023 – but the country isn’t ready<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/504853/original/file-20230117-14-tcl4tj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Simon Maina/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/education/article/2001460374/school-calendar-returns-to-normalcy-in-january-2023">start</a> of the 2023 school year in Kenya marked an important occasion: the first cohort of pupils to adopt a new curriculum in 2017 entered <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/state-directs-primary-schools-host-cbc-s-junior-secondary-4040036">junior secondary school</a>.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.ibe.unesco.org/en/glossary-curriculum-terminology/c/competency-based-curriculum">competence-based curriculum</a>, as it is known, was launched in 2017 to replace the 8-4-4 system that had been in place for 32 years. The older system was <a href="https://kicd.ac.ke/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Needs-Assessment-Rpt-ilovepdf-compressed.pdf">criticised</a> for its emphasis on teachers instructing students and on examinations. An <a href="http://kenya.elimu.net/Policy_Law/Education_Policies/Koech/Koech_Report-Executive_Summary.htm">evaluation</a> in 1998, 13 years after it was introduced, detailed numerous shortcomings. These include subjecting students to a <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1745499917711550">heavy workload</a>. </p>
<p>The new curriculum aims at learners constructing their own knowledge and skills through exposure to challenging situations and experience. It is learner-centred and adaptive to the changing needs of students by encouraging innovativeness and creativity. Learners explore and find solutions in classrooms that are connected to real-life situations. </p>
<p>Since 2017, the new curriculum has been introduced in phases. Children who entered grade 1 at all public schools and all but a handful of private schools that year have been taught the new curriculum since day one. Six years on, <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/education/grade-six-assessment-results-to-be-announced-today-4088712">approximately 1.2 million</a> of those pupils, aged around 12, are entering grade 7. This grade, along with grade 8 next year, will be known as junior secondary school – a stage which hasn’t previously existed in Kenya. This stage will be housed in primary rather than in secondary schools.</p>
<p>But that is about all Kenyans know for sure about junior secondary school. Schools are <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/education/delay-school-opening-to-build-labs-classrooms-parents-say-4075978">poorly prepared</a> to host and instruct junior secondary classes. Classrooms are incomplete, laboratories are lacking and learning materials have yet to be delivered to schools. </p>
<p>On top of this, the presidential Working Party on Education <a href="https://educationreforms.go.ke/homepage">set up</a> in September 2022 to assess hurdles to implementation and other practical questions has yet to publish its recommendations on implementation. The practical issues include a widespread perception that the new system is a <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/education/parents-rue-burden-of-new-curriculum-3513864">financial burden for poor parents</a>. </p>
<p>The government’s immediate task is therefore two-fold. First, it must try to ensure that the quality of education does not suffer. Second, it must provide education without discriminating against any learner based on their social or economic background. This would allay fears that the new system favours the rich.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/6-priorities-to-get-kenyas-curriculum-back-on-track-or-risk-excluding-many-children-from-education-195235">6 priorities to get Kenya's curriculum back on track – or risk excluding many children from education</a>
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<h2>The main challenges</h2>
<p>There are three major hurdles to successfully implementing the new curriculum.</p>
<p>The first relates to preparedness of teachers and teaching material. Facilities like laboratories and workshops that are a key requirement for successful implementation of the curriculum are yet to be built, and the teaching materials are not ready for grade 7 learners. </p>
<p>Three years ago, Kenya’s main teachers’ union <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/education/article/2001326443/sossion-why-we-are-opposed-to-cbc">reported</a> that an internal survey found that few primary school teachers across all 47 counties had been trained to roll the curriculum out. The union said training was truncated from the stipulated five days to just two or three days per school term. Teachers, by their own admission, lack the knowledge and skills they need to follow the curriculum.</p>
<p>This problem is compounded by chronic under-staffing in most schools across Kenya. The teacher deficit stands at over 90,000. This is mainly due to a <a href="http://wbgfiles.worldbank.org/documents/hdn/ed/saber/supporting_doc/AFR/Kenya/TCH/20130515_041150.pdf">freeze in employment</a> imposed in 1997 owing to budgetary constraints. Until the 2022 order to <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/teachers-service-commission-to-hire-30-000-teachers-in-january-4024066">hire 30,000 new teachers</a>, only enough were employed to replace those retiring or leaving the profession through natural attrition. The new hires, though welcome, are a drop in the ocean.</p>
<p>The second hurdle is physical facilities: there simply isn’t enough room for the new pupils. The lack of infrastructure is a challenge which the government hasn’t met over the years. Some learners continue to attend lessons under trees. </p>
<p>Finally, the curriculum has been labelled as very expensive especially for parents in rural areas and those with low incomes. This is because parents are frequently called upon to buy materials for practical classwork. The assumption that all parents can afford smartphones and have access to a computer or printing services for some assignments has also not gone down well.</p>
<p>This would appear to advantage some students at the expense of others and add to existing disparities. This raises concern because education is a basic human right. </p>
<h2>Way forward</h2>
<p>One of the biggest challenges in Kenya is implementation of policies. This was also <a href="http://kenya.elimu.net/Policy_Law/Education_Policies/Koech/Koech_Report-Executive_Summary.htm">evidenced</a> in the early years of the education system that is now being phased out. This is partly due to the failure to involve all stakeholders in education and the private sector to enhance partnerships and collaboration. Working together could promote innovation and research to make the education system relevant and practical. </p>
<p>Faced with the current challenges, the government can borrow a leaf from UNESCO’s <a href="https://www.unesco.at/en/education/education-2030/global-education-monitoring-gem-report/gem21-22#:%7E:text=UNESCO%20calls%20for%20better%20oversight%20of%20private%20education,educational%20institutions%E2%80%99%20high%20costs%20and%20weak%20government%20regulation.">guidelines</a> on quality education for all. The recommendation calls for partnerships of all actors to learn, compile and evaluate good practices, provide resources enabling practitioners to exchange experiences, and pilot and scale up good ideas. </p>
<p>The government needs to ensure quality education without discriminating against any learner based on their social or economic background.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/197202/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Janerose Mutegi Kibaara does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Kenya faces the challenge of delivering quality education without discriminating against learners based on social or economic background.Janerose Mutegi Kibaara, Lecturer of Education Management and Policy, Kenyatta UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1955892022-12-14T13:23:02Z2022-12-14T13:23:02ZKenya in 2022: 4 essential reads on a year of political drama and economic hardships<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497952/original/file-20221129-7082-dfo64q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Motorcycle taxis queue for fuel in Nairobi in April amid shortages.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by Simon Maina/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The year 2022 was always going to be an eventful one. After nearly 10 years in power, President Uhuru Kenyatta was destined to leave office to make way for the winner of the August 2022 presidential vote. Would it be his former bitter rival turned political ally Raila Odinga? Or would it be close ally turned bitter rival William Ruto?</p>
<p>It mattered to millions of Kenyan voters, too, who would lead the country out of a particularly difficult year. High food prices, record fuel prices and the worst drought in 40 years made for a depressing run-up to the election. </p>
<p>Add to these the nagging fears of potential violence at any point in the election cycle. </p>
<p>The Conversation Africa’s academic experts were there at every turn to provide insights. Here are four essential reads on these and other developments.</p>
<h2>A disputed election, but no violence</h2>
<p>It was not a certainty that Kenya would avoid the ugly election violence for which it has become infamous since the post-election killings in 2007 and 2008. Many Kenyans feared this possibility. But the campaigns and post-election period were relatively calm and peaceful. This was despite vigorously contested, close, disputed and at times tense polls. Gabrielle Lynch explains that a great deal has changed since Kenya stood on the “brink of a precipice” in 2008. A new constitution introduced in 2010 heralded numerous reforms, key among them the dispersion of political power and the independence of the judiciary. Key institutions are in need of further reforms to resolve outstanding grievances.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-elections-are-proof-of-change-since-2007-violence-but-more-reform-is-needed-190043">Kenya's elections are proof of change since 2007 violence, but more reform is needed</a>
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<h2>Kenya’s in a hole: time to stop digging</h2>
<p>President William Ruto, Kenya’s incoming president, inherited an economy reeling from many shocks. Like other African countries, Kenyans face unprecedented levels of food and fuel inflation. His options will be further limited by the country’s high debt levels, which have driven the cost of annual debt servicing to almost 54% of domestic revenues – up from 40% in 2020. The World Bank warned of a high risk of debt default. What’s more, writes Odongo Kodongo, the International Monetary Fund’s downgrade of Kenya’s debt risk makes it more expensive for the country to borrow, leaving it with less to spend on other economic programmes.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-has-breached-its-public-debt-ceiling-how-it-got-there-and-what-that-means-190006">Kenya has breached its public debt ceiling – how it got there and what that means</a>
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<h2>Police getting away with murder</h2>
<p>Police killings of citizens are shockingly commonplace in Kenya. Those who bear the brunt are mostly poor, young and male suspects of crime or terrorism. Investigations are rare unless there is overwhelming public outrage stoked by the media, or the victim is well-known or well-connected. The new government dissolved a police squad accused of carrying out extrajudicial killings, but that alone won’t make a dent when the problem is structural rot within the police service, argues Naomi van Stapele. She suggests ways to restore public confidence in the Kenyan police. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-police-killings-point-to-systemic-rot-and-a-failed-justice-system-193468">Kenya: police killings point to systemic rot and a failed justice system</a>
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<h2>Genetically modified food debate</h2>
<p>Kenya lifted a ban on the cultivation and importation of genetically modified crops amid the worst drought in 40 years and soaring food prices. The targeted crops include white maize, the country’s main staple food. The decision was welcomed by scientists who see genetically modified crops as the answer for food security. But it is opposed by a spirited lobby concerned about potential risks to health and the environment. Benard Odhiambo Oloo weighs these fears up against available scientific evidence. He calls for a measured combination of public safety vigilance and government transparency. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kenya-has-lifted-its-ban-on-genetically-modified-crops-the-risks-and-opportunities-192636">Kenya has lifted its ban on genetically modified crops: the risks and opportunities</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/195589/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
With Uhuru Kenyatta leaving office to make way for a new leader, it was always going to be an eventful year for Kenya.Julius Maina, Regional Editor East AfricaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.