Street protests are frequently portrayed as the unfortunate outcome of a failed political system in Kenya, just like in many other nations. According to logic, the inability of state institutions to address grievances through political, legislative, and regulatory action undermines trust and makes the streets vulnerable to roosts of popular discontent.
In this telling, protests are seen as a political issue, with complaints expected to be legitimately resolved using the coercive or consensual mechanisms of the formal political system.
This viewpoint has also been adopted by Kenya’s increasingly paranoid regime, which was led by its predecessors, William Ruto. While generally recognising the right to protest, it has attempted to portray Generation Z’s largely peaceful and sustained protests and agitations as a threat to public order and safety and as a delegitimise the street as a means of addressing public issues.
People believe what is happening in these streets to be fashionable, Ruto said a month ago. They upload selfies to social media accounts. However, I want to let you know that if things go this way, we won’t have a nation.
The state’s preferred response is clear: the killing and abducting of protesters and the decision to charge them with “terrorism” crimes, taking inspiration from Western governments that have criminalized pro-Palestinian and anti-anthem sentiments. At the same time, protesters have been repeatedly urged to discuss their concerns with the government and, more recently, to hold an “intergenerational national conclave” to address their issues.
However, it is flawed to view protests as a risky response to political dissatisfaction. Democracies are the product of demonstrations, not the result of their failures. Beyond formal institutions, transparency, mutual aid, and political consciousness can flourish, according to the Generation Z movement. Grievance, rigorous debate, civic education, and policy engagement have been the topics of activism on the streets and online forums.
Without the assistance of the state or international donors, they have raised money, provided medical care, legal assistance, and supported bereaved families. In doing so, they have reaffirmed the importance of citizenship beyond the five-year requirement of casting ballots. It’s about stepping up to help shape the future, together, creatively, and bravely.
In many ways, the Generation Z movement is a reincarnation of the 1990s reform movement, which saw Kenyans engage in a decade-long street protest against President Daniel arap Moi’s brutal dictatorship. The demand that Ruto be denied a second term in the 2027 election is repeated in defiant chants like “Ruto must go” and “Wantam” echo the rallying cries from 30 years ago: “Moi must go” and “Yote yawezekana bila Moi (All is possible without Moi)”.
A powerful political strategy was to focus the conflict on Moi. It sparked a broad coalition’s unity, attracted international support, and compelled crucial concessions, including the extension of civil liberties and crucially, the assembly and expression rights.
By the time Moi left office at the end of 2002, Kenya was arguably at its most liberated, and its spirit was captured in the Gidi Gidi Maji Maji song I Am Unbwogable! (I am utterly unchangeable and invincible! ) However, that triumph also revealed a deeper danger: the idea that changing the system would mean removing a leader.
Mwai Kibaki, Moi’s successor, was praised then as a reformer and gentleman of Kenyan politics, who quickly began to reverse long-lost victories. His administration attempted to defy constitutional reform, raided newsrooms, and ultimately presided over a stolen election that brought Kenya to the brink of civil war.
In 2003, one of his closest ministers, the late John Michuki, exposed the true mindset of the political class: “One of our own could share power with Moi,” he claimed. Constitutional change to devolve the presidency’s power was only required. He remarked that there was no longer a need for it after Moi had left.
After Moi’s departure, it , it , and the political class’s obstruction, leading to the passage of a new constitution.
Generation Z must steer clear of the 2000s transitional trap. In the political imagination of Kenya, power has frequently been the prize rather than the issue. Real change, however, calls for more than just shifting the state’s names. It calls for a commitment to reshaping the environment where state power operates as well as a refusal to view it as the destination. The youth should beware of political machinations that are more concerned with change than with advancement.
This class’s current demands for national dialogue and intergenerational conclaves should be viewed with suspicion. This has already happened in Kenya. Each of these elite pacts was presented as a means of converting popular discontent into meaningful reform, from the 1997 Inter-Parties Parliamentary Group discussions and the negotiations that former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan brokered following the post-election violence in 2007 to the infamous “handshake” between President Uhuru Kenyatta and his rival Raila Odinga and the failed Building Bridges Initiative. They frequently failed to defuse movements, stifle opposition, and defend established power.
Even worse, Kenya has a long history of appointing reformers to positions of state authority, starting with opposition leaders and journalists and then abruptly abandoning their principles at the top. Political compromise is replaced by racially rhetorical rhetoric. Not transform, but rule and extract is the goal. Many people end up supporting the systems they once opposed.
Ruto must go is a potent method of pressure and mobilization. However, the ultimate goal shouldn’t be taken into account. That was a mistake made by my generation. We forgot that the formal system’s rituals of elections and elite agreements prevented us from achieving the freedoms we now enjoy, and that Ruto seeks to reverse this trend by imposing change on it from the outside. We allowed politicians to sabotage street protests and redefine power and elite consensus as the solution rather than the issue.
Generation Z must take lessons from that setback. Its main goal should always be to reverse the system that encourages and sustains oppression, not to feed reformers into it. Additionally, it is necessary for the streets to remain a legitimate hub for powerful political participation, not one for pacification or criminalization. Democracies are not threatened by its opposition to formal state control. It is a democracy.
Source: Aljazeera
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