The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo

Kenyans on Twitter (#KOT) – a fraternity not to be messed with on global social media – recently took on the IMF following the announcement that the Fund had approved another US$2.34 billion facility for the Kenyan government. The loan is intended to mitigate the fiscal crunch that has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. #KOT’s concern was that the current ruling elite is so corrupt that not only have they stolen and misspent what they had previously borrowed, leading to a public debt portfolio of US$70 billion and rising, they will steal and misspend this new amount as well.

The IMF was forced to respond virtually – which was interesting – explaining the governance conditionalities attached to this latest facility. The Fund’s explanation did little to calm Kenyans and the debate still rages; for many, simply put, the IMF is being asked why it is serving whiskey to an alcoholic on condition that the alcoholic only takes a tot a day and imbibes “carefully”. Kenyans on Twitter believe they know their government better; they are likely right. Unfortunately, no matter how well intentioned, the IMF toolkit is limited – the austerity spanner, loan wrench, conditionality screwdrivers and advisory nuts and bolts, these have been used before, in the 1990s, but this time the consumer is far more sceptical, and with good reason.

We are in the middle of major political realignments as we head into the 2022 general election, with President Uhuru Kenyatta currently serving his last term but clearly keen on a transition that will leave his family’s influence intact. The overall behaviour of the regime, and the elite at its core, is imbued with an assumption of impunity; they have since independence eluded accountability. This impunity gene in our politics can be traced back to the creation of Kenya by the Imperial British East Africa Company (IBEA), a group of businessmen with a royal charter to grab, tax, kill and essentially enslave the population at will. A combination of corruption, profligacy, incompetence, rapacious personalised accumulation, spiralling debt and now the devastating COVID-19 epidemic has – ironically – created the circumstances for the elite to think its way out of a crisis of its own making; as they say, never let a good crisis go to waste. Indeed, others have been here before.

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Some senior civil servants – and even the president himself, so I am told – are known to be fans of Lee Kuan Yew’s book From Third World to First: The Singapore Story – 1965-2000 and share it liberally among colleagues. If they have read it, it is not always clear that they have understood it. A number of Asian countries – notably Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and to a lesser extent Thailand and Malaysia – used the crisis conditions following the Second World War to change the behaviour of their elite and transform their economies and societies. As Ken Ohashi – one-time Senior Economic Advisor to the Kenyan Presidency – explained in a feature carried in The Standard, the East Asian success stories emerged significantly out of a shift away from an “elite-favouring, rent-seeking centred economy” to economies structured to advance when individuals and companies come up with new ideas and are spurred by fair competition. Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore in particular took a dramatic shift away from our elite’s rent-seeking model of business.

In South Korea, President Park Chung-hee, who came to power in a military coup in 1961, ended the Kenyan style of corruption-oriented business by the political and commercial elite. He called in leaders of the traditional, largely family-owned businesses (the chaebols) and essentially forced them to become internationally competitive manufacturers. Ultimately, the majority couldn’t survive in an environment where they could not manipulate government policy and fiddle the books. But the Samsungs, Hyundais etc., flourished and are global giants today. As Ohashi argues, “Corruption never disappeared, but it ceased to be the mainstay of business strategy . . . Taiwan and Singapore managed to revamp the fundamental business culture in a similar way and created an environment in which most companies focused singularly on producing competitive and increasingly higher-value products.”

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In Kenya’s history, the Jubilee regime has been the most sophisticated at managing the perceptions of its performance. Jubilee’s launches of bridges, roads, government programmes and other initiatives are slick and the speeches well written. This is true even when they are launching the same project multiple times. They have also spent more money than any other previous regime doing this. However, in the digital age, they have ultimately struggled and the narrative their media managers try to sell is so far removed from reality that the entire enterprise – even augmented by the likes of Cambridge Analytica – has collapsed in on itself.

This demonstrates the impact social media has had on the political terrain not only in Kenya but all over the world. As governments have become increasingly authoritarian and as the globalisation model has faltered, social media has become a space that is freer than the streets, particularly for the youth. As a result, more and more governments across the developing world have resorted to private intelligence, PR and other reputational management companies to manage this space while others, especially during elections, simply switch off the internet, a tactic that Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, Morocco, Benin, Rwanda, Morocco, Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda have resorted to in the recent past. However, this is not so easy in economies with a reasonably developed service sector and a relatively high use of financial technology.

In Kenya we have several governance balls in the air at the same time: elections (traditionally our season of grand theft); President Uhuru Kenyatta’s transition as he serves out his final term amid talk of changing the constitution and even holding a referendum to effect the change; spiralling corruption and debt; and the return of IMF conditionalities of the kind last witnessed in the 1990s. This time, however, and as I mentioned above, the IMF is confronted with a totally new demographic across Africa. It is overwhelmingly young – below 35; increasingly interconnected by technology; mistrustful of the World Banks and IMFs of this world, and also more aware of the inequities that the elites have wrought in the pre-pandemic era of globalisation.

Kenya’s political elite: hardened and resilient mystifiers

Still, Kenya has one of the continent’s most experienced and resilient political elites. They have over 50 years of experience in political wheeler-dealing, skulduggery, deal-making and sharing the loot from public coffers – uninterrupted by coups, major social meltdowns or grand economic experiments. The odd thing about the corruption perpetrated by an even minimally coherent elite is that it produces a stagnating political stability so long as there is enough loot to share around. It is not an ideal situation and it is fraught with deepening inequality and declining public trust in governance institutions and in the politicians themselves. Still, the guys at the top can hold on and even sustain a hegemon on the basis of backroom deals, understandings and accommodations. And with the right foreign friends this job is made even easier.

Currently, there is considerable bewilderment about the Kenyatta succession as our politicians position themselves for the 2022 elections. Part of this is deliberate mystification. Newspaper headlines sometimes seem to derive from a single photo of politicians at a meeting posted on Twitter where it’s not at all clear what the discussions were about. The mystification is also in part caused by the fact that there are no ideological or significant policy differences between the different competitors for the presidency. Even COVID-19 – the disruptor of the century – hasn’t changed their modus operandi.

The odd thing about the corruption perpetrated by an even minimally coherent elite is that it produces a stagnating political stability so long as there is enough loot to share around.

The pandemic has stripped naked the governance models of all nations and it has been surprising to see what is hidden underneath all the constitutions, institutions, platitudes and political theatre. It has led to a resurgence of authoritarianism where democracy was already in recession globally and there is disquiet that some states will fail. Add to this the fact that China is now a risen power and for the first time, under President Xi, is directly marketing its technocratic/meritocratic authoritarian model as an alternative to liberal democracy which is noisy and free but which can, as a result, be slower in delivering public goods and has, in recent years, produced dangerously comical leaders in some of the most developed countries in the world. China will clearly play a significant role in defining the post-pandemic geopolitical reality.

For our ruling elite, however, the confusion is compounded by the 2010 Constitution which has placed severe limitations on their capacity to disrupt both each other and the governance institutions for their personal political ends. Indeed, the 2010 Constitution was written specifically because of the elite’s penchant to manipulate the previous constitution to their political advantage, as witnessed from 1964 to the late 1990s. Some have described it as a “rule book for naughty boys”, full of self-executing provisions and with a level of detail in terms of institutional design that betrays a lack of trust on the part of its drafters that the elite have any real fidelity to the spirit of the document.

Kenyatta Inc.

What our current elite does now will determine what Kenya will look like in the coming decades. It is thus that Uhuru Kenyatta, who should be a lame duck by now, continues to play an energetic role in his own succession – not necessarily because of his grip on political matters but because of the Kenyattas’ unique private commercial achievements. In fact, there is some concern that all the realignments and political shenanigans could make the 2022 polls more destabilising than previous transition elections. Traditionally, incumbency elections in Kenya – where a head of state is going into elections to compete for another term – are the most violent, as was the case in 1992, 1997 and 2007. Transition elections, on the other hand, when a head of state is serving his last term, as in 2002 and 2013, are far more peaceful.

The Kenyatta family enterprise, whose foundation is built on land acquired during President Jomo Kenyatta’s tenure between 1964 and 1978, is now a highly diversified fledging multinational, with Brookside Dairies as its flagship and significant international shareholding. These commercial interests have been expanded, diversified and consolidated during Uhuru Kenyatta’s tenure as president. Chapter VI of the constitution on Leadership and Integrity – especially those of its provisions that touch on conflict of interest – does not exist in our political reality.

Meanwhile, public debt has accumulated so rapidly under the Kenyatta regime – Kenyans believe that much of it has been misappropriated – that the mess in public finances no longer has a technical fix, only a political one. Indeed, the outrage expressed by Kenyans on social media at the IMF’s US$2.3 billion facility was caused by the belief among many that this money will also be stolen. Some of the conditionalities the IMF has insisted on in apparent good faith – such as the reform of key state-owned enterprises – were particularly controversial because of the conviction among some that this was a green light for them to be taken over by the very people who precipitated the debt crisis in the first place.

Chapter VI of the constitution on Leadership and Integrity – especially those of its provisions that touch on conflict of interest – does not exist in our political reality.

Local real estate company Knight Frank estimated that by last year Kenya had over 3,000 dollar millionaires. The question that looms over the succession and transition currently underway – and which may explain why it is so confusing – is this: a small group of families have emerged from the last eight years spectacularly wealthy; how do they protect this wealth going forward? Similar questions faced elites in South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, etc., especially after the Second World War, but the elites in those countries ultimately chose a generally inclusive form of meritocratic governance.

There are many elites who, having accumulated wealth which they wish to protect in perpetuity, choose to securitise and militarise their politics – essentially throw liberal constitutions out of the window and hold on to the power to steal through a mixture of manipulation, bribery and force. There are those who would argue that the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) is a vehicle to politically engineer the elite out of the structures imposed on them by the current constitution and essentially emerge with a political deal that serves all their political and commercial interests. Others argue that the elite inclusivity that informs the Building Bridges Initiative – expensive as it will be – is just what Kenya needs. This is a considerably more uncertain model than, say, the Taiwanese or South Korean ones, where the elites fashioned a political and constitutional arrangement that served not just their own interests but those of the entire population as well. Securing the peace and prosperity of the masses is the surest protection for the wealth of the elite.

The combination of factors – the impact of COVID-19; upcoming elections with all the realignments they imply; a volatile region; increasingly unmanageable debt; and, most importantly, the demographic challenge of a now thoroughly disillusioned youth who no longer believe politicians or trust their own governance institutions – will force some of the most consequential choices our hardened elite have ever made. Multinationals like the Kenyattas’ need political predictability and policy consistency unless they are in the extractive sector, selling alcohol, drugs or cigarettes rather than perishables like milk and yoghurt.

Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo Two days to the third Sagana State Lodge meeting, called by President Uhuru Kenyatta in the absence of his deputy William Ruto on 30 January 2021, 41 central Kenya MPs sent a no-holds- barred letter to Uhuru. The Sagana meeting came hot on the heels of a “state of the nation address to the Kikuyu people” at State House, Nairobi, on 18 January.

The 51-minute question and answer session — in reality a monologue from President Uhuru — was broadcast live on all the Kikuyu-language radio stations. The president was for the umpteenth time beseeching the Kikuyu voter to unquestioningly and unequivocally accept the logic of the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI), whose latest moniker is Building Billionaires Initiative.

The Building Bridges Initiative was birthed immediately after President Uhuru and Raila Odinga shook hands on 18 March 2018. Three years into the handshake, President Uhuru’s backyard has shunned the document and basically ignored the President’s pleas to support it. The exclusively ethnic meeting with the Kikuyu radio and television presenters and the Sagana State Lodge baraza were a concerted effort to bring the Kikuyu rank and file to his side.

Among the salient issues that were contained in the MPs’ 12-page letter, four stood out for me:

“In Nyamakima, Gikomba, Kamukunji and on Taveta and Kirinyaga Roads, businesses have closed as besieged traders relocate to the rural areas to dress their wounds.”

“In the bitter cold of a freezing July [sic] at the height of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic, hardworking Kenyans in Ruai and Kariobangi were woken up in the terrible turmoil of heavy machinery pulverising their homes, businesses and little hustles.”

“It has also been noted that you’ve never visited any part of Mt Kenya region to say thank you.”

“For eight years, between 2011–2018, you consistently and persistently cautioned us that Raila Odinga was Kenya’s foremost problem and pleaded with us to send him home for the country to move forward. The successful effort you made to persuade the people to render Raila Odinga unacceptable in Mt Kenya cannot be undone in your lifetime.”

That letter specifically addressed the Kikuyu people’s economic problems after the 2017 presidential elections that saw Uhuru’s win on 8 August 2017 cancelled by the Supreme Court of Kenya on 1 September only for him to win a pyrrhic victory 56 days later, on 26 October. Sworn-in on 28 November, Uhuru’s victory could not hold – hence the handshake just three months later. President Uhuru would later tell his Jubilee Party members that he could not have effectively ruled the country with Raila still in the opposition.

Kikuyus are the largest ethnic community conducting business in Gikomba, Kamukunji and Nyamakima and on Taveta and Kirinyaga Roads. The “hardworking Kenyans in Ruai and Kariobangi” referred to in the letter to Uhuru are Kikuyus. The “you cautioned us” statement also refers to the Kikuyu. But did not the president himself address an ethnic matter in an ethnic language, couched as a national question? The MPs might as well have written their letter in Kikuyu.

Three years into the handshake, President Uhuru’s backyard has shunned the document and basically ignored the President’s pleas to support it.

The Nyamakima debacle was reported in The Elephant in 2019. In July 2020, The Elephant published a piece about the Kariobangi North evictions. The brutal, state-sanctioned demolitions – the letter speaks of a “freezing July” but the evictions actually took place during a very cold month of May — were visited on the hapless impoverished ghetto dwellers. Thoroughly embarrassed, the government asked the Internal Security Principal Secretary’s office to identify all the victims of the evictions and indemnify them quietly away from the glare of the public and the press.

The 41 MPs were not invited to Sagana because they do not belong to President Uhuru Kenyatta’s wing of the Jubilee Party, dubbed Kieleweke, but belong to Tanga Tanga, a tag that connotes a loiterer. The MPs’ letter was a deft move by politicians who have detected dissent from rebellious peasants against President Uhuru and smelt a rat on a waddling president who is serving his lame- duck years and could therefore afford to tell him off without fear of recrimination. (In October 2019, The Elephant published a story titled The Rebels Within: The politics of Kieleweke and Tanga Tanga in Central Kenya.)

Immediately after his December holidays in his Murang’a County, on 30 December 2020, Senator Irungu Kang’ata penned “a letter to my president”. The long winding letter was just about one thing: “Mr President, you’re unpopular and not wanted in Mt Kenya region. And you know why. Period.” A month and a half after the letter was leaked to the press, Kang’ata was replaced as Senate Majority Whip by Kiambu County Senator Kimani Wamatangi on 9 February 2021. Kang’ata had replaced Nakuru County Senator Susan Kihika in May 2020; she was removed because she belongs to the Tanga Tanga team.

The address to the Kikuyu nation boomeranged on the beleaguered President, even as he hoped to frame his monologue as an “us vs them”, “us” being the Kikuyu and “them” being the Kalenjin. “How could the President have the audacity to tell the Kikuyu poverty stricken fellow that the government loses KSh2 billion every single day?” posed Stanislaus Njogu of the Kĩama Kĩa Ma (the Truth Council).

“The Kikuyus were very furious; if Uhuru thought he was impressing them, he had scored zero points,” Njogu, an elder from Kiambu County said after listening to the president calling them andũ aitũ (our people), Kikuyus decided that “Uhuru nĩ kwĩyarĩria ekũĩyaragĩria na kũoguo ecokeria.” President Uhuru had been talking to himself, therefore, he can as well answer himself. Njogu said many Kikuyus wanted President Uhuru to desist from using the royal “we” when referring to them, “we are no longer together”. The mzee said that is what some of the council members had told him. The MPs’ letter was a deft move by politicians who have detected dissent from rebellious peasants against President Uhuru.

Kĩama Kĩa Ma, which is led by engineer Patrick Mwiru from Gatundu South, is a much bigger and more credible organisation than the Wachira Kiago-led Kikuyu Council of Elders. It is more active, more broad-based, has both a youthful and an older membership, the majority from Kiambu County.

The statement on the daily theft of KSh2 billion had particularly infuriated ordinary Kikuyus: “Gũtirĩ mũici na mũcũthĩrĩria,” there is no thief and onlooker, said a middle-aged man who had just paid his dues – a sacrificial lamb – to the Truth Council in order to be initiated as a junior elder. “So, Uhuru’s aware of the exact cash that is being pilfered daily from the state coffers? Therefore, he knows who does it? What has he had done about it? That money is probably stolen by himself and his cronies. He can’t keep telling us Ruto is a thief – did we elect Ruto or Uhuru?”

Mũtahi Ngunyi, nowadays a State House operative, recently told me that Ruto being referred to as a thief by Kikuyu political barons was a shot in the dark: “Kikuyus grew up being called thieves, big deal, the word thief to a Kikuyu is not an abomination, to tell them that Ruto is a thief is to remind them that, indeed, he’s one of them. Try something else.”

The junior elder said President Uhuru had failed the Kikuyus miserably and for that they were hell- bent on punishing him. “Gĩathĩ kĩa ngũha gĩthiragĩra gũtũ.” The resolve of a tick (a parasite) to draw blood from a cow ends up at the ear. “It seems the Kikuyus’ resolve to seek revenge on Uhuru is total,” said Njogu. “Right now, they are behaving like the proverbial tick: they won’t rest until they draw blood.” Njogu said the leadership of the Truth Council will not publicly voice their dissent against the BBI, but it is not happy. It doesn’t want to pick a fight with Uhuru, not now, but the followership which is mostly made up of middle-aged men was taking no prisoners.

“After ruining our lives, Uhuru now wants to impose Raila on us,” said the junior elder. “The hatred for Raila among the Kikuyus is total: we’ll never accept him. I’m a true Kikuyu and will never vote for him. If Raila is such a fanciful idea to [Uhuru], how come he has yet to bring him to us? It is because he is unsellable – now more than ever before. Ruto’s a thief, uh huh? We like thieves. Kaba gũciara mũici gũkira kĩrimũ.” It is better to sire a thief than an idiot, said the junior elder.

The junior elder said President Uhuru’s association with David Mũrathe leaves a sour taste in the mouths of many Kikuyus. “Murathe is a scam, he’s a loudmouth and no sane Kikuyu pays attention to his utterances.” He alleged that Murathe had sold the Gatanga seat to Kanu in 1997, and for that, Kikuyus, especially those from Murang’a County, had not forgiven him. Kanu – then led by President Daniel Moi – is anathema to Kikuyus.

One June evening last year at the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Murathe went for a drink at Castle Inn in Garden estate. Some Murang’a moguls who patronise the club found him seated at the counter alone. Once ensconced in their corner, they summoned the manager and told him to evict Murathe. These tycoons are the kings of downtown Nairobi, overseeing multi-million shilling businesses that include real estate and major distributorships of both alcoholic and soft beverages, among others. The moguls, who on a quiet evening, in a single sitting, can write a cheque for tens of thousands of shillings, call the shots at the club. Murathe was asked to leave immediately, his unpaid bill notwithstanding.

Maina Kamanda, a nominated MP and a vocal BBI proponent who has accompanied Raila several times as he tries to make inroads into the hearts and minds of the Kikuyu, is also held in contempt, especially by Kikuyu traders in Nairobi. “They consider him selfish and a sectionalist,” said Njogu. Although he hails from the greater Murang’a, Kamanda’s home is today in Nyandarua County, near Ol Kalou town, where he bought land and where he is mostly to be found when not engaged in politics.

“Kamanda is a spent force, he neither speaks for Kikuyus in Nairobi nor Murang’a,” said a street vendor from Murang’a County. “If he is still interested in politics, he should run in Nyandarua. We’ll never elect him here in Nairobi, and he can’t be voted in Murang’a after dissing his ancestral home.” Njogu said it was odious that President Uhuru should ask Kamanda to accompany Raila to address Kikuyu rallies: “Kamanda draws only scorn and distaste from Kikuyus.”

President Uhuru had treated Merus recklessly and shabbily, said a Kĩama Kĩa Ma Meru elder. “I’ll tell you this, Merus are very annoyed with Uhuru for taking us for granted. Even after some of us voted for him thrice, he hasn’t found it fitting to at least say thank you. He hasn’t visited the area, he just moved on with his life after getting the Meru votes.” He could not but be nostalgic about President Mwai Kibaki’s days. Kibaki was Kenya’s third president between 2003 and 2013. “Kibaki was an honourable old man, he knew how to say thank you and we loved him. How we miss the days he was President.”

The notion that President Uhuru had “neglected” the Mt Kenya region, especially the region occupied by Embu, Meru and Mbeere people, was also echoed by Joseph Nyagah in a conversation we had weeks before he died on 11 December 2020.

If President Uhuru’s radio interview was a “car crash”, the outcome of the Sagana State Lodge meeting was even less soothing to struggling Kikuyus. “You mean Uhuru has just acquiesced to the greedy MCAs?” said Muchiri, a Nairobi businessman. “He can find KSh4 billion to give to politicians to buy cars, but he can’t find money to stock medicine in hospitals? We’ll be waiting for these MCAs next year, 2022 is not a century away and for Uhuru and his BBI, he can bribe the MCAs all he wants, we’ll not pass the damn document.”

Njogu said Kikuyu hatred for President Uhuru had gone grassroots. “The angriest are those that voted for him twice in 2017. They cannot now believe that he’s wining and dining with Raila.” The mzee said that Kikuyus consider this to be the ultimate insult. “After poisoning them against Raila for such a long time and to now tell them that he’s the man they should work with was just mindboggling.”

Faced with the threat of being taken to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in 2012, Uhuru Kenyatta whipped up ethnic Kikuyus in a well-choreographed tribal mobilisation the likes of which had not been witnessed in modern Kenya. By election day on 4 March 2013, Kikuyus were so filled with anti-Raila venom that they could have died or killed for Uhuru. “Uhuru succeeded in dangerously balkanising the Kikuyus, telling them that Raila was planning to send him to the ICC once he takes over as President of Kenya,” said a lawyer from Kiambu County that I interviewed in 2012. That lawyer is one of the writers of the BBI (II) document that proposes a powerful presidency.

Thiya ndĩthũire mũmĩũragi ta mũmeanĩrĩri. An antelope hates those who expose it to danger more than it does its predators. “Kikuyus have always been wary of Raila’s intentions if he ever took state power,” said Njogu, quoting to me the above Kikuyu idiom, “They have a lot of misgiving about him: from truly believing that he will revenge against them for the sins committed against his father [Jaramogi Oginga Odinga] by [Jomo] Kenyatta to weirdly believing that when he says he will fight institutional corruption, he actually means that he will ensure they are cut to size, that is, crash their businesses and riches.” If President Uhuru’s radio interview was a “car crash”, the outcome of the Sagana State Lodge meeting was even less soothing to struggling Kikuyus.

Njogu said Kikuyus like reminding themselves how Raila crafted the narrative of “‘41 [tribes] against one’, inordinately exposing his malicious intentions against the Kikuyu people.” In the lead-up to the hotly contested 2007 presidential election that pitted President Kibaki, running on a Party of National Unity (PNU) ticket, to Raila who was running on an Orange Democratic Party (ODM) ticket — with Ruto as Raila’s de facto running mate — the 41 vs 1 came to be viewed as the opposition’s official mantra.

During Raila’s recent meet-the-Kikuyu-people Githurai Market tour, the wary Kikuyus could be heard saying “tũramuonera eitini,” meaning, “we are aware of Raila’s dubious intentions”. Raila arrived at the Market at 10.30 a.m. on 28 January 2021 and went straight to the Migingo area. The market is divided into several areas such as Posta and Family Bank. Migingo is now ring-fenced because it had encroached on railway land, but it is still expansive and it can hold a meeting.

At Migingo Raila was welcomed by the market leaders led by Joseph Wanyoike and Peter Kamau. They told him about the need to construct a bridge to connect to the railway line area that was separated by the fence. Ever since the fence was erected, people have to walk a long distance to cross over to the other side. Raila promised that the government would build the bridge. It was a short meeting and he moved on to the roundabout area where the masses was waiting.

Raila spoke to the crowd atop his vehicle, cautioning them not to be confused by the “wheelbarrow” narrative as he extolled the virtues of BBI. “Will you allow that man of the wheelbarrow to sow his retrogressive politics here?” Raila upped his rhetoric. The waiting crowds answered him by chanting Ruto’s name interspersed with shouts of “wheelbarrow”. The crowd did not allow him to continue speaking, with some yelling, “you cannot feed on rhetoric.”

The crowd exasperated Raila and he accused Jubilee Party-nominated Senator Isaac Mwaura of inciting them. On 9 February Mwaura was demoted and stripped off his senatorial position by the party. Mwaura had indeed visited the market area on the eve of Raila’s visit and incited the people. “Nĩmwakĩmenya rũciũ nĩagoka, mũkĩmenye ũrĩa mũkamwĩra.” You are aware (Raila) is coming here tomorrow. I hope you’ve planned what to tell him.

Mwaura, whose entry into the political limelight was through the opposition ranks when he was nominated as ODM MP in 2013, was to shift gears and join the ruling Jubilee Party in 2016, where he was rewarded with yet another nomination in 2017. Keen to enter elective politics, Mwaura seems to be preparing to contest the Ruiru constituency seat in Kiambu County. He has defected once more – this time within the Jubilee Party ranks – and thrown in his lot with the Tanga Tanga team. His bashing of the BBI has greatly displeased the president, who must have sanctioned his sacking.

In October 2020, Ruto too had gone to Githurai Market. The market is a catchment area, which represents a cache of votes because of its huge population that straddles Nairobi and Kiambu counties. The deputy president came along with 500 wheelbarrows and 100 mkokotenis (push carts). He had certainly done his “market survey” (pun intended). The wheelbarrow is the most sought-after piece of equipment at the bustling market. Because of this, it is also the most stolen item. Traders who do not have their own wheelbarrows hire them for KSh50 a day and in the evening, they pay an extra KSh20 for storage overnight. Each of the wheelbarrows that Ruto delivered came with an umbrella to protect the trader from the vagaries of the weather. “Detractors of the wheelbarrow can say all they want,” said 30-year-old trader Peter Mungai. “For all the 10 years I’ve lived in Nairobi, I’ve earned my keep from this wheelbarrow.” Mungai started hawking watermelons on a pavement next to the market. Then in 2019, a brutal eviction by Nairobi County askaris led to the loss of goods and equipment including wheelbarrows and push carts. Mungai bought a new wheelbarrow and now hawks sugarcane.

“Hawking sugarcane has a much wider radius than melons,” explained Mungai. “I’ll tell you this: I voted Uhuru two times in 2017, but look at his gratitude. I don’t want to know about BBI, its promises and lies, I’ve no need for it. Make no assumptions, I went to school, I can read and comprehend. In the 10 years I’ve lived in Nairobi, I started a family, all because of this wheelbarrow. In 2022, I’ll be voting for Ruto, because I’m a wheelbarrow hustler.”

“Uhuru and Raila and indeed anybody else can criminalise the wheelbarrow. What have they ever given? I don’t want to speak much, some of my friends were lucky to get a wheelbarrow from ‘thief Ruto’. They can hustle and deliver something to their families in the evenings. Meanwhile ‘thieves Uhuru and Raila’ can continue selling BBI, telling us it will bring us [Kikuyus] goodies. It is good because our children will feed on something called promises hidden somewhere in the BBI, which must wait to be passed by a referendum.”

The story of the wheelbarrow, in the words of Mungai, indeed cannot be spoken about much here. It is a story for another day. Suffice it to say that at Githurai Market I met a 27-year-old Kenyatta University BA graduate. From an impoverished peasant family, he did not waste time looking for a non-existent job after graduating with an upper second in economics. He landed at Githurai Market and started carrying the market women’s goods as a kua, a man who carries a load on his shoulders.

“Look at me, I’m a lanky fellow, but was I going to further burden my mother with my survival problems? She had already done much and I’ll be eternally grateful for ensuring I got some education. At the market, the women call him Ka-Waithira, son of Waithira, because that is how he calls himself. From kua, Ka-Waithira graduated to a wheelbarrow owner and made his work easier. “I’m now looking to investing in a push cart, because it carries much bigger and heavier loads.”

Ka-Waithira told me he had expanded his skills to include balancing accounts for the market women: “You’d be shocked to learn the kind of money these women handle. I was.” In his spare time he also explains simple economics to the women – supply and demand theory, economies of scale, the difference between macro- and microeconomies. “I really have no time for Uhuru and BBI. He has hugely let my mother down. She believed in him and it nearly killed her because of depression. Githurai, as you’ve seen for yourself is a ‘hustler nation’. Uhuru has only been interested in advancing his family’s fortunes and the Kikuyus have become the wiser. Do you think I’d be languishing here at Githurai Market if I came from a well-connected family or I schooled at St Mary’s?”

As President Uhuru Kenyatta plots how to woo the recalcitrant Kikuyus back into his political fold, it is evident that his work for in the next 16 months is cut out him. For now, he has to contend with a gleeful Deputy President William Ruto who seems to have effortlessly taken over his backyard.

Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

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Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo

Deputy President William Samoei Ruto has hit the campaign trail hard. He has provocatively billed the next presidential election the “hustlers versus dynasties” duel, which broadcast journalist Joe Ageyo thinks is new to Kenya’s politics.

In a Citizen TV talk show, Ageyo suggested that Ruto might be doing politics differently, mobilising and organising his political base along the dominant social-economic cleavages, and not the usual ethnic-regional conundrum – often presented as transient ethnic kingpin coalitions during general elections.

Certainly, Ruto’s invocation of an existing socio-economic cleavage between those in power and unemployed youth lends Kenya’s notoriously ethnicised politics a class overtone. Has William Ruto, a wealthy, self-styled born-again Christian politician, whose long political journey that began earnestly as the organising secretary of the surreptitious Youth for Kanu 92 (YK’92), undergone a Road-to- Damascus-like political conversion? Or is this vintage Ruto, grabbing any opportunity he can find to ruthlessly pursue his interests to achieve his lifelong dream of becoming president?

Hustler nation

Speaking in Nyamira County recently, Ruto said, “Some people are telling us sons of hustlers cannot be president. That your father must be known. That he must be rich for you to become the president. We are telling them that even a child of a boda boda or a kiosk operator or mtoto wa anayevuta mkokoteni (child of a cart pusher) can lead this country.” In a country that is tottering on the brink of economic meltdown, a youth budge and political despair, this is music to the ears of a desperate youthful population.

The deputy president’s chief critics remind him that surnames have hardly ever handicapped one’s presidential ambitions. Jomo Kenyatta, Daniel arap Moi, and Mwai Kibaki’s became president, and their fathers’ names were totally unknown to Kenyans. Only Uhuru Kenyatta, who Ruto ably assisted to win the presidency in the last two presidential elections, has a father who is known to Kenyans because he was the country’s first president.

Ruto, the self-styled spokesman of “the hustler nation,” also stated, “On dealing with hustlers, Raila should leave that to me. He does not understand the plight of hustlers. He is the son of a vice president and he was born being driven around.”

So why does Ruto proudly claim to be the “hustler-in-chief”? Hustler means different things to different people, but for many Kenyan youth, it signifies humble beginnings or means of eking out a living – respectable or otherwise. Being a hustler means one has found a way to stay afloat, particularly in hard economic times. The ambivalent feelings this word evokes match the legal and moral ambiguities that Ruto has built around his political career.

The deputy president has the gall to identify with the very youth whose present and future the Jubilee government has committed to misery by mismanaging the economy. He is appealing to youthful voters who will comprise the majority of first-time voters in 2022.

Wheelbarrownomics

But more than assuming their identity, what the deputy president has ably done is to locate the youths’ anxiety: their discontentment and deep frustration with the government. Frederick Kariuki, 29, a qualified accountant and a budding entrepreneur in Nairobi, is the latest convert to the political movement that is seemingly sweeping the country: The Hustlers. He told us that Ruto’s “wheelbarrownomics” (a word coined by Kenyan economist David Ndii) has struck the right note with the youth who believe Ruto could be their saviour.

“Those talking ill of the wheelbarrow gifts are pretenders to middle class, pedantic mandarins associated with President Uhuru’s wing of the Jubilee Party that is fighting Ruto. After lying to youth during the 2017 presidential campaigns, afraid and embarrassed by the swelling hordes of youth without work who are threatening to explode, the government belatedly came up with kazi mtaani (casual wage labour). What is the difference between kazi mtaani, where college graduates are being supplied with slashers for cutting grass and paid 400 shillings (which is still stolen from them) and Ruto’s dishing of wheelbarrows and push carts?” posed Kariuki.

“Ruto has correctly seized the moment to sell his hustler narrative, which has caught on like bush fire, even if it means bringing down a government he helped install in power. And why not? He has outwitted his nemesis through his tactical political manoeuvres and that’s what realpolitik is all about.

“A wheelbarrow costs 4,000 shillings and a pushcart 20,000 shillings. A cursory visit to Nairobi markets – Gikomba, Githurai and Marigiti – will show you what difference a wheelbarrow can make to a fruits’ hawker. The wheelbarrow is what many youth are using to hawk their wares. Many a youth in the ghetto, hoping to enter into the business of selling water, cannot because they simply can’t raise 20,000 shillings. Ruto then comes along and gives you a push cart. Between kazi mtaani and wage labour of unguaranteed 400 shillings, which would you rather have? What has President Uhuru’s government and those politicians criticising Ruto offered the youth? Nothing. They should keep quiet. I’ll be voting Ruto very early in the morning and pushing his agenda between now and 2022.”

Muigai, a friend from Fly Over, which is 50 kilometres from Nairobi and on the Nairobi-Nakuru highway, returned to the country just after the 2017 double presidential elections. Despite being armed with a college degree from a prestigious university, he has yet to find work. He was full of expectations; at 24 years of age, he believed the world was his oyster. But every single day, he sees his word crumbling before him.

His relatives encouraged him to come back home because they believed that Uhuru Kenyatta would create jobs for the youth, especially Kikuyu youth. “Since returning home, I’ve seen my family’s increasing disenchantment with President Uhuru Kenyatta,” said Muigai.

“At Soko Mjinga Market, the wheelbarrow is king, and they dare criticise Ruto? What has Uhuru himself offered other than destroying our businesses?” asked Muigai’s angry maternal uncle. “The Building the Bridges Initiative? They may say all they want about Ruto, that’s the person we’ll be voting for and we cannot wait to do it. The Kenyatta family will know we’re no longer their slaves.”

The underdog narrative

When Ruto teamed up with Uhuru in 2013 to form the Jubilee coalition, he wore shirts emblazoned with the president’s name. In April 2011, Mama Ngina Kenyatta, at Gatundu Grounds at the Kenyatta family’s ancestral home in Kiambu County, lay hands on her son Uhuru and his International Criminal Court (ICC) co-accused William Ruto after stating: “I’m sure Uhuru and Ruto will go to The Hague and come back so that we can proceed with nation building.”

Ruto had already set his eyes on the prize: the presidency. He was supposedly the smarter one of Jubilee’s so-called “dynamic duo” who reeled off “facts and figures” at political rallies as he rode on Uhuru’s back, family name, and deep-state connections to the State House. For a man who was tried at the ICC for crimes against humanity, allegedly for his role in the 2007/8 post-election violence against the Gikuyu walala hoi of Rift Valley region, he has successfully circumvented the established Gikuyu elite gatekeepers since 2013, and won the hearts and minds of a significant cross-section of the Gikuyu rank and file.

“I’m from Ishaweri, in Gatundu and I can tell you, there’s nothing to report home about the president coming from our midst,” said Peterson Njuguna. “The Gatundu youth spend their time drinking illicit liquor, loitering and engaging in petty crime. In Gatundu, poverty glares you in the face. Why? The president cares less about them. He doesn’t know who they are, he’s least bothered whether they drink themselves to death or not, and here he and his minions are criticising Ruto who dares to give the youth some equipment.

“The Kenyatta family is so mean, they never mix with anyone, leave alone offering any kind of help or hope. But they will be quick to rubbish anyone who seemingly steps in to do something. So what if Ruto is doing it for politics? What has Uhuru himself done for politics? I’ve heard some Kenyans ask: how many wheelbarrows can you give people? Here is a government that promised the youth jobs and more jobs under their watch. Instead what happened? They have systematically presided over the destruction of the economy, so that they can offer slashers to graduates and President Uhuru loyalists have the temerity to talk about Ruto’s symbolism. Uhuru should just go home and leave us alone. We can’t wait for him to bring along the BBI, that’s the day he’ll know the fury of an awakened lot.”

Ruto’s love for his hustler tag dovetails with his “chicken-seller-who-became-president” fib. With every media appearance featuring a jua kali artisan, a wheelbarrow, or an evangelical clergyman, his public image is that of a God-chosen wretched of the earth’s presidential candidate in 2022.

An evangelical group of Christians in Nairobi who have already aligned themselves with Ruto’s campaign told us that the deputy president is indeed “a fearful man of God and God is prepping him to take over the reins of power after Uhuru Kenyatta. His wife (Rachel) is a prayerful woman and they have even erected an altar of the Lord in their house, so they wake up at night to fervently pray and commune with God”.

The group reminded us that Ruto has been very helpful to churches, contributing to their expansion and growth. The group did not seem to be bothered by the source of the money: “It is not for us to judge, the temple of the Lord is for all of us – the righteous and the wicked. At the end of the day, it’s God to judge. There are people who talk a lot, yet we’ve never seen what they have done for the house of God.”

The deputy president casts himself as the rich and powerful politician who rose from selling chicken to the dizzy heights of the presidency. His grass-to-grace underdog narrative, his “humble” birth vis- à-vis his rivals’ “privilege”, and his difficult childhood encapsulate the identity, dreams and aspirations of millions of unemployed youth. Like Donald Trump in 2016, he is using the rhetoric of the “outsider” who has come to save an underclass trampled on by the undeserving upper class.

Ruto has set the political tone of the 2022 presidential election; the rest are merely reacting to it. Ruto’s presidential campaign has seized on something that resonates with many, especially the have- nots in difficult economic times. The “hustler’s narrative” serves Ruto’s campaign as a moral allegory for anyone who loves a good underdog story.

The narrative has also cast Ruto as the would-be saviour of the Kenyan have-nots, someone who feels and knows their suffering. He is the God-fearing, battle-ready general, leading the war against the Raila Odinga-aided Kenyatta family political gimmicks. It sets the hungry underclass against the Uhuru-Raila attempts to monopolise Kenya’s state power and economy through the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI). No one exemplifies the success of this hustler narrative than the Ngara Market traders, who specialise in second-hand (mitumba) clothes in downtown Nairobi. When we paid them a visit on one sunny Saturday afternoon, we found them in the middle of a heated argument about Ruto’s brand of politics.

“My wife was teacher in a private school until a few weeks ago,” said one trader. “Then one morning, the school proprietor sent her an email telling her he had converted the school premises into exhibition stalls. That was it. My wife was reduced to a hawker, peddling avocados on a wheelbarrow.

“We cannot wait for Uhuru and Baba (Raila Odinga) to bring on the BBI referendum. They’ve been telling us Ruto is the government thief. Is he the one who stole COVID-19 money?” asked one of the traders. “If Ruto is a thief, it is because they have been stealing together with Uhuru.”

Said Kipkemei Bunei, “Ruto is a thief who has been giving back (to the society). What have the other thieves been doing?”

Ruto’s campaign infantilises the 2022 presidential debate by deflecting adult conversations that would scrutinise his long political career since he burst into the national limelight in 1990s. He tells the rags-to-riches chicken seller-hustler story to stoke the youth’s anger against the very government he is still a part of, but which is now being propped up by Raila Odinga and his ODM party. The narrative flattens the complex histories of political families and individuals – an erasure ably aided by Raila’s support of the incompetent Jubilee government. The hustlers’ rallying call rattles his competitors and rouses his supporters. He only needs to mention the word “dynasty” to communicate who his political enemies are.

“Ruto has won the war of narratives,” said Gakuo Munene, who has openly stated he will support the deputy president in his presidential bid for 2022.

The electoral strategy is clear: set the majority without known surnames against the minority who have widely recognised surnames because their fathers were cabinet ministers, vice presidents, or even president. And the “hustlers” are spoilt for choice.

Ruto might have belatedly discovered the great socio-economic divide between the walala-hoi and the walala-hai in Kenya. However, to merely acknowledge that such a deep rift exists, to crudely name it as “hustler versus dynasties”, and to constantly remind the walala-hoi of their suffering is not to wage a class struggle. As Thandika Mkandawire, citing Karl Marx, observed, “The existence of class may portend class struggles, but it does not automatically trigger them. It is not enough that classes exist in themselves, they must also be for themselves.”

Ruto’s political campaign is not a class struggle; it is a struggle for power – for himself. He is organising and mobilising his political base the same way the political sons of the late Daniel arap Moi organised their politics – through transactional methods that exploited human need, greed, ambitions for power. Despite its class warfare undertones, Ruto’s acerbic political rhetoric is not a rallying call to the wretched of the earth to take on their oppressors or to organise for such a war. Baronial politics

Like Francis Atwoli, the bejewelled trade unionist-turned-political kingmaker, who has taken to summoning the rich and powerful to his Kitengela home, Ruto also summons a few hand-picked hoi polloi to his palatial homes in Karen and Sugoi. Both Ruto and Atwoli perform acts that clearly show what power asymmetry is all about, who is the host and who is the guest, who pays the piper and who calls the tune, even though they have divergent political projects.

So, the jua kali artisans or the delegation of Christian clergy troop to Ruto’s official residence in Karen or Sugoi not as the deputy president’s equals, but as carefully selected guests with a prescribed role to play in Ruto’s political script. It has the hallmarks of what former Chief Justice Willy Mutunga calls “baronial politics”. Ruto has yet to discover progressive democratic politics. His “hustlers” are guests, not equals, who are summoned for PR stunts. Their images are exploited for whatever legitimacy a paid-for and stage-managed association with a jua kali artisan or a Christian pastor can lend his presidential bid.

True to script, the guests or delegates are paraded for the cameras next to wheelbarrows or beauty salon equipment as any lucky winner of a sports betting lottery would be. It sends a message to the walala-hoi to keep betting on Ruto’s leadership because that holds a lottery ticket that might just win big in the next grand draw if they elect him.

Ruto seeks to distinguish himself from his nemeses by performing and publicising such acts. As the Elgeyo Marakwet Senator, Kipchumba Murkomen’s tweets suggest, such events show that Ruto, unlike Raila and Uhuru, is both rich and generous, a politician who gives motorcycles and car- washing machines to unemployed youth. However, his tweets say little about why thousands of hard working youth who desire to own small or medium-sized businesses cannot afford the start-up capital needed for such items, or why so many small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have shut down since the Jubilee Party took control of the government.

Ruto’s hustler narrative may tug at the heartstrings of the millions who are poor and unemployed, but it’s simply a pithy campaign phrase that is ideologically as empty as the Building Bridges Initiative – a promise of a qualitative change in living conditions that will not materialise because there is no qualitative change in the political leadership.

Ruto may now be viewed as being against the Kenyatta family’s political and financial interests, but he’s not yet a pro-democracy and pro-suffering citizens’ politician. He may successfully stoke and channel the anger of hungry citizens against the political elites, but there is no evidence yet that he’s organising along existing class cleavages, awakening the consciousness of the exploited about the nature and identity of their exploiters, or forming alliances with autonomous organisations of exploited classes.

For the first time in decades, Kenya’s middle class progressives – the numerically small and tenacious civil society groups, which have always punched above their weight – seem to have been totally eclipsed by Ruto’s middle class rabble-rousers. Kenya’s progressive middle class may still have a credible story to tell on democracy, constitutionalism, and the strengthening of devolution, but it seemingly has no candidate to stand with in the 2022 presidential election. Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo

Article 129 of the Constitution of Kenya 2010 states: “Executive authority is derived from the people of Kenya and shall be exercised in accordance with this Constitution…in a manner compatible with the principle of service to the people of Kenya, and for their wellbeing and benefit.”

The Executive (the President) must protect the constitution, safeguard our national sovereignty, promote the unity of the nation (including recognising the diversity of the people and communities), and protect human rights. The Executive is bound by national values and principles of governance. Its duties include maintaining good governance, state finance, integrity, transparency, accountability and foreign affairs.

As the CEO of the government, she also has special responsibility for matters assigned to other ministers: a strong economy, peace between communities, foreign affairs and international relations, national security, and international relations. She must also demonstrate respect for the people, and bring honour to the nation, dignity to the office, and promote public confidence in the integrity of the office. Most importantly, she has the responsibility to serve the people, rather than the power to rule them.

The status of the Prime Minister is different. Normally she is the head of the party with the most members in the main legislature. She appoints government ministers from members of the House. At Kenya’s independence, the CEO was designated the Prime Minister (PM). Jomo Kenyatta was PM for a year and then he changed the system to a presidential one, with himself as president – a system that has remained, despite strong support for a parliamentary system at Bomas.

The PM’s support stems partly from the sense that a PM, coming from and accountable to Parliament, is usually far less of a dominant figure, and her power is less centralised in one person, which was one of the objectives of the search for a new constitutional order. Another reversal from a parliamentary to a presidential system – again motivated by individual self-interest – occurred in the closing stages of the Committee of Experts process.

A reason why at Bomas there was strong support for the parliamentary system was precisely to ensure that the government was under greater control and scrutiny of the public. The Prime Minister emerges from the collective will of the people in the elections, and can be removed by the legislature by a vote of no confidence. It is far harder to remove a President.

But a President is not – in theory – some unguided missile. Checks and balances are supposedly more developed in such a system.

So how has our President performed?

The President and the Judiciary

The Judiciary is the third major arm of the State. Our President has little power to make or remove judges. A number of key decisions are made by the Justice Service Commission, an independent body to which the President appoints two lay members. However, the President’s choice has been from those who can take orders from him, not those who can represent the people as the Constitution requires. In defiance of court orders, he has blocked the appointment of many candidates. He has also criticised judges in office, especially in recent years, and often when his own position is challenged (as in elections).

The President and the economy

African governments play a significant role in the nation’s economy. Over the decades, the state has helped to establish a modern economy, increasingly based on the private sector. Governments have established institutions of various kinds to regulate economies at regional and international levels. The Kenyan government has probably retained more of a direct engagement with the economy than many. The state has also affected the economy in financial, monetary and other areas.

Uhuru Kenyatta is not known for his business skills, nor did he distinguish himself when he was Minister of Finance. Yet he took it upon himself to negotiate deals (largely in secret, as the Chinese prefer) with the Chinese government for skills, equipment, and money. The very costly standard gauge railway (SGR) deal with China is shrouded in secrecy. A court has decided that by-passing the law on public procurement on the excuse of a “government-to-government contract” was illegal. There has been corruption in the purchase of land for the line and stations, little control over the construction of the line, and very little attention given to the position of Mombasa as a county and the country’s major harbour.

The environment and industry

There have been concerns about the environmental impact of many big Chinese infrastructure projects, including high-speed trains and big dams. China is financing a coal-fired power project that is strongly resisted by the local community. Evidence suggests it is not needed in view of Kenya’s renewable energy sources. The SGR has also had a negative impact on Kenya’s wildlife as it passes through the Nairobi National Park despite vigorous opposition from civil society, including litigation. The decisions on the railway’s route were made by the Kenyan government. Local firms have suffered as a result of the government’s preference for Chinese firms for construction and other projects.

The State as entrepreneur

There are around 260 state-owned enterprises (commercial, like the Kenya Ports Authority; infrastructural, like the Rural Electrification Authority; regulatory, like the National Environment Management Authority; social, like the Kenyatta National Hospital, and teaching- and research- based, like universities). The general view of parastatals in Kenya is negative, including because of politicisation of the parastatals and poor corporate governance. Their boards and chief executives are appointed by the politically powerful, including the President himself. Thus, many operational decisions are made by the partisan and the non-expert. The role of the state corporations’ advisory committees is just advisory, with little impact on policy or practice. The structure of financing and financial management is weak – many state corporations are allocated funds through line ministries. They are chronically underfunded.

When the President chooses appointees, the whole basis for parastatals is undermined. Indeed, those appointments are usually illegal. By making appointments on an ethno-political basis, the President breaks another obligation of his office: promotion of respect for the diversity of people and communities. The Constitution requires executive authority to be exercised in a manner compatible with the principle of service to the people of Kenya, and for their well-being and benefit. It is heartening to now see that many citizens and organisations have raised their objections to presidential appointments on grounds of violation of the letter and spirit of the Constitution. Self- interest lies at the heart of what ought to be public service for the nation.

A genuinely open and competitive process would far more likely produce competent appointees who are respected by the public. But even if the appointees are the best available, the whole process is wrong – it depends far too much on patronage. Promoting or fighting corruption?

One of the most critical challenges facing the Executive is, unfortunately, corruption. It started with Jomo, followed by Moi and Kibaki, and now has increased beyond imagination. The economy is largely based on partnerships between businesspeople and politicians or public servants.

Various attempts are made through the Constitution to eliminate corruption. Article 73 sets the high standard demanded of public officers, including bringing honour to the nation and dignity to the office. State officers are expected to promote “public confidence in the integrity of the office” and to make decisions that are “not influenced bv nepotism, favouritism, other improper motives or corrupt practices”. Their task is to serve the people, rather than to rule them. But the grip of the Executive on appointments is a major obstacle to dealing with corruption – indeed it is corrupt.

Rarely are business-related acts conducted without significant bribes (to the extent that more foreign businesses, including multinationals, have left Kenya than come in recently). Corruption within state institutions (taxes, customs, contracts, procurements, land appropriations, schools and universities, etc.) has never been so intensive.

The police (which is often praised by Uhuru even when it commits brutal acts against innocent citizens), whose mandate is to serve the people, is perhaps the most corrupt institution we have. Of late the President has shown an apparent concern to fight corruption. But dealing more firmly with people within his administration who are suspected of corruption should have been a policy from the beginning. The Executive cannot maintain that “others” are corrupt.

Corruption may no doubt make some Kenyans rich. But it also makes an infinitely larger number of other Kenyans poor. On a broader basis, the President has shown little sympathy for the poor, whose numbers have increased, not decreased, not least because of the current coronavirus pandemic, which led to massive job losses and produced “corona millionaires” through dodgy procurement practices and corruption.

The President and the Constitution

Uhuru has little regard for the Constitution, though he pays lip service to it. If the law does not suit him, he ignores it. Indeed, it seems that the Executive takes the view that if it wants to do something, it will do it regardless of its constitutionality. And it will only decide, if a court objects, whether it will observe the court’s rulings. Think of the takeover of Nairobi County, the creation of the post of Cabinet Administrative Secretary, the importation of the military into the cabinet, the effort to muscle in on the appointment of the Chief Justice, and the tendency to order supposedly independent officers (like the Director of Public Prosecutions) to do things that it wants done.

With such a scorecard, it is hard to make a convincing case for Uhuru Kenyatta’s government.

Published by the good folks at The Elephant. The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo

Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

By John Githongo

“Lord, protect me from my friends; I can take care of my enemies.”

The above quote by Voltaire is one that Deputy President William Ruto could well be spending lots of time brooding over, especially in these times of coronavirus. Since official recognition of the pandemic’s arrival in Kenya over just three months ago, Ruto’s political battles – not with his enemies, but with people he had counted as friends – have intensified. The battles that are being fought in the Jubilee Party, the party of President Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta, are internal and among erstwhile friends.

Coming barely 30 months after the forceful UhuRuto duo won a controversial fresh presidential election on October 26, 2017, the two political brothers looked set to finish their second term the way they started the first: as a formidable team of like-minded captains, with the lead captain passing the baton to his comrade once his term expires. But that today is a dream: the waters have been poisoned and the former buddies are no longer swimming in the same direction, leave alone swimming in the same waters. The breakdown of the alliance has all the hallmarks of betrayal, brinkmanship, deception, fraud and subterfuge. Jubilee Party mandarins did not see the break-up coming; if they did, they all pretended they were not aware of the imploding scenario. The ruling party is now a house of two diametrically opposed camps led by their respective protagonists: President Uhuru Kenyatta, who coalesces around the Kieleweke (it shall soon be evident) camp and William Ruto, who is spearheading the Tanga Tanga (roaming) team.

“We can no longer pretend that the current war being waged against William Ruto is not from within and therefore not from friends, or people he had presumed were his political friends,” said a Ruto confidante I spoke to. “To think otherwise now would, like the proverbial ostrich, be burying our heads in the sand. It is better to be fought by your enemies, who you have fought several times before and therefore you already know to deal with them, rather than be fought by friends, who have turned the tables against you, all the while posing as your compatriots.”

“Uhuru is employing political terrorism against his number two and to be honest, it is something we had not anticipated,” said Ruto’s friend of many years. “Yes, it has taken us by surprise, the intensity and all, but we must stay and fight back, even as we devise a strategy to stem the political bloodbath. It is all about the politics of succession in 2022 and there is no hiding the fact that Ruto obviously wants the seat. If you have been a deputy president for seven years, what else would you want as a politician in that position? It is also true that once Uhuru and Ruto were sworn in for the second and final term, we started popularising our candidate immediately – it was the natural thing to do – hitting the ground running. This was misconstrued to be a campaign, but even if it were, we weren’t doing anything outside of the constitution.”

Ruto’s loyal friend said that the popularisation strategy had a context: “Prior to the presidential election in December 2002, we all were in Kanu – Uhuru, Ruto and me. We would go to [President] Moi and tell him, ‘Mzee tell us who will be our candidate so that we can start preparing the grounds early.’ And he countered by saying: ‘Nyinyi vijana wacheni mbio, siku ikifika nitawambia. Mimi nimekuwa kwa siasa miaka mingi…nataka mwendelee kuwa wafuasi kamili wa Kanu.’ (You young men, why are you in a hurry? When the day comes, I’ll let you know. I’ve been in politics for many years, I know what I’m doing. For now I want you to be steadfast in your support for Kanu.) By the time he was proposing Uhuru as the party’s candidate, it was already too late and there wasn’t enough time to campaign for our candidate.”

The Ruto ally, who also counts President Uhuru as a first-name-basis friend, believes Uhuru lost the election in 2002 to Mwai Kibaki and the opposition, because Moi took too long to name the party’s flagbearer. “We could have won that election but for Moi’s delaying tactics, which backfired and we lived to regret that bad decision. Eighteen years later, with lessons learned, we’re not about to repeat the same mistake. You cannot win a presidential election if you start campaigning six months to the election date. That is what Uhuru is doing with our candidate and in Jubilee, and we won’t let him do that.”

The coronavirus appeared just in time to help President Uhuru fight his political battles, reasoned the DP’s bosom buddy. “He is now using the pandemic to wage war against his deputy. The semi- lockdown and the curfew are strictly not about COVID-19, but about clamping down on Ruto’s forces in the party and in government.” The pandemic, he observed, has acted like godsend: It has given Uhuru space to mount a sustained onslaught on Ruto, but it has also helped the DP to ward off (at least for the time being), the “nobody-can-stop-the-reggae” force, which was also threatening to overwhelm him.

“Uhuru is maximising on the COVID-19 pandemic as much as possible because he knows his antagonist, the DP, cannot organise and mobilise for his counter-attack, which he is good at. The people have been locked down, they are restricted, they cannot move, they are scared and are caught up with survival. President Uhuru can therefore wreak havoc in Ruto’s camp with as little distraction as possible,” he added.

Uhuru is not alone; since the onset of COVID-19, some world leaders have been using the pandemic as an excuse to amass more presidential powers, extend their presidential terms indefinitely, resort to dictatorial tendencies, and quash opponents.

But unlike the last election, the president does not have the unflinching support of his own people. “Uhuru’s biggest problem is that the Kikuyus have turned their back on him,” said a friend of Uhuru who also counts Ruto as his friend. “He thought he owned them and he could do whatever he wanted with them. He also thought they would always go back to him and do his bidding. Now, they seem dead set in ignoring him completely and the fact of the matter is, as a political leader, you can do little if you cannot galvanise the support of your people. You cannot claim legitimacy, you can only impose yourself on them and that is always counter-productive.”

Because of this, said the Jubilee Party mandarin, President Uhuru’s current headache is how to de- Rutoise central Kenya and the larger Mt Kenya region. “He’s been trying to tell the Kikuyus that Ruto has been disloyal to him, that he wants to grab their power, that he’s not fit to ascend to the presidential seat because he’s corrupt and power hungry. But they have refused to listen to him. With each passing day, he’s getting furious with the Kikuyus’ recalcitrant stand against him. Now, he has turned to appointing Kikuyus in prominent positions, including the recent reshuffles in Parliament to appease his Kikuyu base.”

The duo’s friend told me that President Uhuru’s allegations about his deputy’s insubordination was a red herring. “What disloyalty is Uhuru is talking about? When he was busy drinking, we held fort by taking care of government business, even as we covered his social vices. Now he has the temerity to talk about disloyalty. We’re not afraid of him. The Jubilee Party/Kanu coalition agreement is illegal as per our Jubilee Party constitution and it was cobbled up to stop Ruto from vying for the presidency”.

All the president’s men

To fight Ruto, President Uhuru Kenyatta formed an advisory team that meets at State House. Part of the team comprises David Murathe, Kinuthia Mbugua, Mutahi Ngunyi and Nancy Gitau.

Murathe has for the longest time been President Uhuru’s sidekick. His father, William Gatuhi Murathe, was one of the wealthiest Kikuyus, courtesy of Uhuru’s father and the country’s first president, Jomo Kenyatta, During Jomo’s time, the senior Murathe was the sole distributor of wines and spirits countrywide.

When David Murathe was routed out as the MP for Gatanga constituency by Peter Kenneth in 2002, his fortunes dwindled and he was even declared bankrupt at one stage. From that time, he has not left Uhuru’s side. The Tanga Tanga team describes Murathe as “Uhuru’s attack dog”. They believe that when Uhuru wants to communicate an important message, he uses Murathe. And they’ve learned to decipher his messages. Murathe is the man who has been put in charge of the advisory team’s budget. On 6 January 2019, Murathe suddenly resigned from his post as the Jubilee Party’s vice chairman, citing conflict of interest. He said he wanted to fight Ruto and stop him from being the Jubilee Party’s sole candidate for the 2022 presidential election. On 2 March 2020, Murathe recollected his thoughts on his supposed resignation and claimed he had not really resigned because his resignation had not been accepted by President Uhuru Kenyatta, who is the chairman of the party.

Kinuthia Mbugua is the State House Comptroller; he keeps President Uhuru’s diary. He served as Nakuru County governor for one term. Eagerly looking to serve for a second term, he nonetheless lost the Jubilee Party nomination to Lee Kinyanjui. He was furious, and even looked to run as an independent, but was persuaded by Uhuru to join the presidential campaign team, with a promise of a bountiful reward once the campaign was over.

The Tanga Tanga team describes Murathe as “Uhuru’s attack dog”. They believe that when Uhuru wants to communicate an important message, he uses Murathe. And they’ve learned to decipher his messages.

Mbugua, a career civil servant, hails from Nyandarua. When he was the commandant of the Administration Police (AP), he employed many youth from Nyandarua and the adjoining areas. He equipped the force with personnel and machinery and soon there were murmurs from the regular police service, which felt that the AP was being favoured and was becoming extra powerful. After the 2007/2008 post-election violence, President Mwai Kibaki and his cohorts did not trust the regular police. Mbugua’s not-so-loudly spoken brief was to reorganise a force that had always played second fiddle to the boys in blue.

Mbugua to date believes William Ruto rigged him out of a nomination when he was left to man the Jubilee Party headquarters at Pangani during the chaotic and hectic nominations. He carries the grudge like an ace up his sleeve.

Mutahi Ngunyi is a private citizen who has immersed himself in state (house) politics and has distinguished himself as a maverick, a person who can swing like a pendulum and still remain standing, without falling. In the lead-up to the 2017 election, he made Raila Odinga, the opposition coalition leader of the National Super Alliance (NASA), his punching bag, terming him a “punctured politician”, an epithet that his detractors used to describe Raila’s father Jaramogi Oginga Odinga in the 1970s.

After Uhuru and Ruto romped back to State House, Mutahi quickly (perhaps too quickly) identified with Ruto’s camp and decreed that Ruto will be the next president come 2022. A crafty mythmaker, he even came up with the Hustler vs Dynasty narrative to define the rivalry between Ruto and the sons of prominent Kenyan leaders, including Uhuru Kenyatta, Raila Odinga and Gideon Moi. He wildly claimed in a May 2019 tweet that the only person who could liberate Kikuyus was Ruto. (Mutahi has since deleted all his tweets that were singing Ruto’s praises.) Then, beginning this year, Mutahi flipped, disavowed his hustler narrative and claimed that Uhuru Kenyatta was ordained to rule Kenya.

“Mutahi Ngunyi is a gun for hire,” said a Ruto aide. “For nearly two years he worked for us. He’s a mercenary, he’s a fugitive of justice.” When I contacted Mutahi and asked him if what was being said about him was true, he responded: “Tell them it is true, whatever that means. Tell them they can also hire me!”

The aide claimed that Mutahi was presented with the National Youth Service (NYS) file by the National Intelligence Service and was asked to cooperate…or else. The NYS file he was referring to contains details of a huge scam that was perpetrated between 2014 and 2016 when Anne Waiguru Kamotho, the current governor of Kirinyaga County, was the powerful Devolution and Planning Cabinet Secretary. Mutahi was one of her advisers on the youth programme that was being implemented by NYS. The scam involved the misappropriation of billions of shillings of taxpayers’ money in which Mutahi was heavily implicated. At one time, he even purported to clear his name by claiming to have returned Sh12 million to the government coffers. Appearing before the Parliamentary Accounts Committee on September 20, 2016, Mutahi said he had rewired the money back to the Central Bank of Kenya. He said that the money had been “wrongly” credited to his company, The Consulting House. He further stated that he believed the money had come from an organisation that he had consulted for, not the Devolution Ministry.

Mutahi is now operating from State House and The Chancery building on Valley Road in Nairobi. The Chancery is owned by the Kenyatta family. Part of his brief is to spin favourable Kieleweke group narratives while conjuring up propaganda and disinformation on his former employer, William Ruto.

Nancy Gitau has been the resident State House adviser from the time of Mwai Kibaki. Before becoming a state aficionado, she worked for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). While at USAID in the 1990s, she was involved in the democracy and governance sector, which was being heavily funded by the United States and other donors. The last big project that she oversaw was a partnership between Kenya’s Parliament and the State University of New York (SUNY, Albany)’s Centre for International Development (CID), which Sam Mwale and Fred Matiangí managed. Both Mwale and Matiangí would later become civil servant bureaucrats, serving as Permanent Secretary and Cabinet Secretary, respectively.

Mutahi is now operating from State House and The Chancery building on Valley Road. The Chancery is owned by the Kenyatta family. Part of his brief is to spin favourable Kieleweke group narratives while conjuring up propaganda and disinformation on his former employer, William Ruto.

Gitau was very well-known within the civil society and the NGO sector and interacted with many of them. “Gitau was one of the architects of a report implicating Ruto in the post-election violence and so there is no love lost between her and Ruto,” said Ruto’s aide. The deputy president is still upset about Gitau singling him out. During the days when Ruto and Uhuru were facing charges related to the post-election violence of 2007/2008 at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, one of Ruto’s team members said to me: “Ruto never forgives and never forgets a wrong done to him.”

Expunging Ruto’s men

The Gitau-led advisory team ostensibly meets every Sunday morning at State House and during weekdays at La Mada Hotel located in the New Muthaiga residential area in Nairobi. La Mada is the hotel that Ruto claimed in 2019 where a plot to assassinate him was being hatched by people known to President Uhuru.

One of the team’s main jobs is the expunging of Ruto’s men in the Senate, with Kithure Kindiki, the Senator of Tharaka Nithi County, being the latest casualty. Until 22 May 2020, Kindiki was the Senate’s Deputy Speaker. The first two casualties were Kipchumba Murkomen and Susan Kihika, the former Majority Leader and Chief Whip, respectively. Murkomen’s job was given to Samuel Poghisio, a politician from West Pokot, while Kihika’s went to Irungu Kangáta, the Senator of Murangá County. “The two were removed because the president and his men didn’t have the majority in the Jubilee Party’s National Executive Committee (NEC),” said a “renegade” senator, who accused President Uhuru of “using strong-arm tactics to coerce senators to vote according to his whims”.

During the days when Ruto and Uhuru were facing charges related to the post-election violence of 2007/2008 at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, one of Ruto’s team members said to me: “Ruto never forgives and never forgets a wrong done to him.”

The senator said that the Speaker of the Senate, Ken Lusaka, was allegedly approached and reminded of the “small matter” of the wheelbarrows when he was the Governor of Bungoma County.

When Lusaka was the governor of Bungoma County between 2013 and 2017, the county bought 10 wheelbarrows worth Sh1.09 million (approximately $10,000 or $1,000 per wheelbarrow) – the most expensive wheelbarrows ever sold in Kenya, where an ordinary wheelbarrow goes for around Sh5,000 ($50). When he was asked by the Parliamentary Accounts Committee what was so special about the wheelbarrows, he claimed that they were made from “stainless, non-carcinogenic material”. Some of the county officials were jailed for the scam.

Everybody knows it was illegal for the speaker to acquiesce to President Uhuru’s demand that the Senate Parliament Group meet at State House, said the senator. “The reason why nominated senators are being intimidated and threatened is simply because Uhuru doesn’t have enough senators on his side to fight his deputy.”

Senators were allegedly paid Sh2 million to vote to remove Murkomen and Kihika. “On the day the senators were summoned to State House, President Uhuru didn’t have enough senators to push his motion,” said the senator. “The Jubilee Party had only 11 senators, Kanu, three and one independently-elected senator, Charles Kibiru. If you count Raphael Tuju and President Uhuru they made 17 votes. Tuju is the secretary general of Jubilee Party. So, they were way short of the required majority of 20 votes.” The senator claimed that the president had to send helicopters to pick senators from their far-flung regions.

“Uhuru can send choppers to senators who are supposed to be in lockdown and in quarantine, but he will not send planes to rescue and send food to flood victims. That’s how much he cares for the unity of this nation,” complained the senator.

It is just a matter of time before these elite squabbles are replicated on the ground. On 20 May 2020, two charged groups in Kikuyu town faced each other: one group supported President Uhuru Kenyatta and the other supported Deputy President Ruto along with the area MP Kimani Ichung’wa. So far Kimani has been an unswerving supporter of Ruto. They yelled and shouted at each other and exchanged invectives. It was a prelude to Ruto’s visit to the constituency on that day.

It is hard to tell whether the two groups had been paid by their masters to grandstand. But that is neither here nor there. The Jubilee Party honchos have indicated that Ruto’s presence in the Mt Kenya region cannot just be wished away – hence the Kieleweke group’s project to defang Ruto. I asked a Ruto confidante why his boss had gone quiet. Was the heat becoming unbearable? “This is not the time to speak. We actually advised him not to open his mouth. There’s a time that he will speak, but not now.”

The confidante also reminded me of another saying: The man who speaks little makes mistakes, but what about the man who talks a lot? He makes big mistakes.

Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo In October last year, Uhuru Kenyatta fired a broadside at imports of fish from China: “The Finance bill has passed but we can think outside the box. We might as well say the fish imported is bad then we lock it. There are many ways the government can work if we really intend on serving our people.”

The trick backfired. The ban was imposed in November and lifted two months later following what was reported as a “biting shortage”. Had he taken a quick peek into the Economic Survey – the government’s annual statistics report that should be on his desk – he would have noted a steady decline in domestic fish production over the last five years – from 160,000 tonnes to 98,000 tonnes, a difference of 35,000 tonnes. Imports in 2018 were 22,000 tonnes, not enough to plug the deficit. On several occasions prior to the ban, senior government officials had been widely reported explaining that Kenya has a large and growing fish deficit. That they went ahead to implement a harebrained roadside declaration tells us everything we need to know about the state of sycophancy in the Jubilee government.

The latest from the Uhuru Kenyatta out-of-the-box policy institute is a proposed ban on used motor vehicle parts. Initially reported as a blanket ban, the Government has since clarified that it is limited to particular parts that endanger safety, such as brake pads. Sensible, isn’t it? Roads full of overloaded matatus and Proboxes with faulty brakes is a scary thought.

Road safety is not the business of trade policy. The person most at risk from a defective vehicle is the driver so, a safe, roadworthy car is in their interest. That said, drivers do kill and maim themselves and others far too often, not just because of defective vehicles but also by dangerous driving, notably speeding and drink driving. I can say without fear of contradiction that defective drivers, and not defective vehicles, are the single largest cause of road accidents. Moreover, there is no law that compels owners to service their vehicles. In many countries, vehicles over a certain age are required to undergo regular roadworthiness inspections. In the absence of a law requiring vehicle owners to replace worn parts, banning the import of used parts is an exercise in futility. What, then, is the ban in aid of?

Some economic history background is helpful and this is the history of the import control regime that was in place from the early 70s to the early 90s. The regime was a two-stage process, the first of which was the acquisition of an import licence. Import licences were issued by a committee of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry known as the Import Management Committee (IMC). Having acquired an import licence, one proceeded to apply for a Foreign Exchange Allocation Licence (FEAL) at the Central Bank. The role of the IMC was to implement quantitative restrictions. It would review the imports to be authorised based on the domestic production capacity and adjust the amount of imports that would be allowed in accordingly. Obviously, it is impossible to do this for hundreds of products when both the production capacity and the size of the market are constantly changing. Moreover, for some strategic products, importers were required to obtain a “no objection” from the domestic monopoly.

While import substitution industrialisation became the accepted justification, this was actually not how the control regime came about; import substitution industrialisation had been proceeding satisfactorily using tariff protection without import and foreign exchange controls. The regime was put in place in response to the effects of the 1973 oil price shock on foreign exchange and the controls were supposed to be temporary, to be lifted once the effects of the shock subsided. The effects subsided and were, in fact, followed by a coffee boom that more than offset the oil price shock, but the control regime remained.

I can say without fear of contradiction that defective drivers, and not defective vehicles, are the single largest cause of road accidents

Once it was in place, people discovered that it was useful in other ways. Everything about the regime was subject to bureaucratic discretion that could be abused – and was abused – in two ways. First, the determination of import tariffs was completely discretionary, and was determined to a considerable extent by political influence as opposed to economic logic. Second, influential incumbents were able to buy protection not just from imports but also from potential domestic competitors. Suppose an established incumbent noticed a competing product from a new local manufacturer on the shelf. With sufficient influence, the incumbent would get the bureaucrats to frustrate the competitor by denial or long delays in obtaining import licences or foreign exchange allocations. The surest way of buying influence was to have a business relationship with powerful people in government, either as sleeping partners or as distributors or suppliers. The overall effect was a corrupt, distorted, unpredictable policy regime that stifled competition and rewarded inefficiency, effectively undermining investment and entrepreneurship.

It should not come as a surprise then that by the early 80s, import substitution industrialisation had stalled. In Sessional Paper No.1 of 1986 on Economic Management for Renewed Growth, the government owned up to the failure of import substitution industrialisation and ushered in the era of market liberalisation and economic policy reforms known as structural adjustment programmes (SAPs). The paper argued that the state-centric protectionist economic model had reached a dead end. In particular, it highlighted the system’s failure to create jobs and warned that, unless it was reformed, we would be “overwhelmed” by population growth.

The trade regime was one of the first targets for reform. The first task of the reform agenda was an exercise known as tariff harmonisation, which culminated in three tariff bands: 0 per cent for raw materials and capital goods, a 10 per cent band for intermediate products and a 25 per cent band for finished goods. Also included was a list of items prohibited for health and safety reasons. The second task was the removal of import licences and foreign exchange controls, which was completed in 1993. The same regime was subsequently adopted by the East African Community. The effect of these reforms was to level the playing field and to tie the government’s hands, and the policy regime itself became stable and predictable. It is this policy straightjacket that the out-of-the-box solutions are meant to circumvent.

In Sessional Paper No.1 of 1986 on Economic Management for Renewed Growth, the government owned up to the failure of import substitution industrialisation and ushered in the era of market liberalisation and economic policy reforms known as structural adjustment programmes (SAPs)

Up until 1993, the reforms had been proceeding in fits and starts, with several reversals in between due to resistance from vested interests. But in the aftermath of the 1992 general elections, the Goldenberg chickens came home to roost. Staring an economic meltdown in the face, Moi accepted to open up the economy in exchange for a financial bailout. The impact was immediate; trade boomed and within a year, Nairobi’s city centre was transformed into one big bazaar. People spruced up. On the streets, you could no longer tell people’s socio-economic status by their appearance – everyone was well dressed. In the rural areas, patched up clothes disappeared. Everyone wore shoes. Motor vehicle ownership boomed. Vehicle registrations, which had been in decline, rebounded immediately, growing 22 per cent per year over the next five years, and 12 per cent per year over the decade (see chart). Owning a decent car ceased to be a status symbol for the upper echelons of society, and they resented it – some still do.

The rationale for foreign exchange controls – that liberalisation would cause scarcity – was blown out of the water; foreign exchange availability actually improved. But most importantly, the prognosis of the 1968 Sessional Paper on employment was vindicated; employment growth doubled from 4.8 per cent in the previous decade, to 9.4 per cent in the decade following liberalisation. This labour absorption was driven by an explosion in micro and small enterprises, particularly in trade, but also in jua kali manufacturing and in other sectors as well. Supermarket shelves featured a wide variety of colourful, affordable local brands of consumer goods – toiletries, shoe polish, vegetable oils – where previously choice was limited to two or three staid multinational brands that had remained unchanged for twenty years or more.

Staring an economic meltdown in the face, Moi accepted to open up the economy in exchange for a financial bailout. The impact was immediate; trade boomed and within a year, Nairobi’s city centre was transformed into one big bazaar. People spruced up.

Uhuru Kenyatta’s grand scheme, the Big Four manufacturing agenda, is predicated on the restoration of protectionism. But import licensing and exchange controls – the old tools of the trade – are no longer available, hence the “out of the box” solutions.

The used spare parts ban opens a window for bureaucrats to rummage through every consignment of used car parts looking for prohibited parts. Bribes, demurrage and other transaction costs will go up. Many businesses, particularly small ones, will be driven out of business. Maintaining the diverse models of imported used cars will become a challenge and the used-car import trade will be strangled to death by regulation and bureaucracy.

The Draft National Automotive Industry Policy featured in this column a month ago has precisely this situation as one of its objectives. This ban complements the plan to initially lower the maximum age of used-car imports to five years from the current seven, and then to three years, effectively putting cars out of reach for many people.

But the Government has a plan – model rationalisation and homologation. Model rationalisation means reducing the number of models sold in the market while homologation simply means state certification. The policy is “geared towards an entry model for the local market based on acceptability and affordability”. In short, the state will choose one model of car that will be mass- produced for the local market.

The logic of this is as follows: because we are a small market, having too many models makes it difficult for the local assemblers to have economies of scale. This of course means that the chosen model will be frozen in time technology-wise, and will probably be available in just a couple of colours. But of course, in other markets, design and technology will be moving on and therefore, this will only work if “the people’s car” is protected from the imported used cars that consumers would prefer.

This has been done before; India had the Ambassador, the Soviet Union had the Lada, and East Germany the Trabant. We had the Peugeot 504, which we kept assembling for at least a decade after it had gone out of production. I had the good fortune of visiting Berlin in my youth, just a year before German reunification, and I still recall the surreal images of Trabants sputtering along on one side of the Wall while BMWs, Audis and Mercedes Benzes whizzed by on the other. I find it difficult to contemplate that, thirty years on, and on the cusp of the fourth industrial revolution, we have apparatchiks formulating communist industrial policy.

In the decade after the 1993 “big bang” as we called it, the economy created four million jobs – 400,000 a year, compared to 80,000 a year in the preceding decade. In the absence of these reforms, Kenya would have preceded Zimbabwe on the route to land invasions and economic meltdown. We may not have led then, but we are certainly doing our best to follow now.

Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo On the night in August 2017 when the results of Uhuru Kenyatta’s electoral win was announced, my neighbours broke out in celebration. Red flags waved outside windows. Vuvuzelas punctuated the loud night. My father and I went to the main road to watch the spectacle. Men, women, children, it seemed even dogs and cars… everyone sang and cheered along the road. A river of bodies winding along the road chanting their gratitude to whichever deity was listening.

In the preceding weeks, I had sensed a lot of tension among my friends and various social circles. But I had told myself that it was inevitable that the incumbent would win.

“Nothing can happen. Uhuru has the numbers anyway. There’s no way he’s not winning this election,” would be my unyielding refrain in those charged political discussions.

The chorus continued like the unbroken chime of a clock.

“Tyranny of numbers.”

“Tano tena.”

“Wembe ni ule ule.”

We went to sleep with smiles on our faces. Happy that “our man”, a designed Jesus from Gatundu had won and would continue with the “great” work he was doing.

But on the “other” side of the political divide, things were not so peaceful. There was anger and disappointment. At first, I was dismissive about it. It felt like the same old song by the supporters of opposition leader Raila Odinga. How could they have been robbed when they didn’t have – at the bare bones of it – the tribal numbers?

It was practically common sense that in Kenya’s political landscape, all you need to win a presidential election is solid votes from Rift Valley, Central and half of Nairobi. And those places bled and swore red by Jubilee. Tuko Pamoja. So how could opposition supporters think that their election was “stolen”? “Accept and move on,” came the rhetoric from “our side”.

But accept and move on to what? And the honest truth is, I was completely aware of the sins of Jubilee, and yet I had supported them and celebrated their victory. I cannot even begin to explain the disconnect here, which makes it all rather unforgivable. Why was I so quick to forgive Jubilee? Was it because I had accepted their mendacity and moved on, and now expected others to do the same? Was it because I am Kikuyu? Because I from middle class Nairobi and the status quo suits me better?

But those who refused to accept these election results endured gunfire, teargas, armed raids from the security forces, and even death, and continued to say no. Some of the victims were not even actively involved in demonstrations. Yet those on “our side” still defended Uhuruto. When I began to speak out against police brutality – the innocent victims had begun to tug at my heart – those on the “other side” called me foolish for imagining that the only crime here was police brutality. They were right – when I compiled Jubilee’s biggest transgressions before 2017, I might as well have worn a neon sign marked, “Dunce”.

In 2013, Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto arose like sainted phoenixes from the ashy aftermath of the post-election violence that rocked the country five years earlier. “We won” against the white man’s broad sweep of justice. “Our boys” made it out alive.

Their vision seemed clear enough. Umoja, Uchumi, Uwazi. Unity, Economy, Transparency. The President himself was a billionaire; one of the richest men in the country. There was no need to worry about corruption.

“He’s already rich. He won’t steal,” I heard it said many times. And I agreed. It seemed logical.

After 2013, Jubilee has come under fire for various issues plaguing Kenyans. In 2014, the Public Procurement Administrative Review Board nipped the laptop in 2014 project in the bud after it was discovered that the tender to supply the laptops wasn’t awarded fairly.

In 2015, the National Land Commission found that land belonging to Lang’ata Road Primary School was invaded on by the Weston Hotel, which the deputy president owns a stake in.

That same August, the Auditor General, Edward Ouko found that Sh100 million of taxpayers’ money was used by deputy president William Ruto to charter a private jet.

In October 2016, investigations found that the Health Ministry had misappropriated Sh5.2 billion. Not forgetting Chickengate, where a British national (who has jailed and has since been released) paid bribes of up to Sh50 million to Kenya National Examination Council and Interim Independent Electoral Boundaries Commission.

And of course, the catastrophe that was Eurobond. In September 2016, Standard Media reported that the Auditor General was unable to account for Sh215 billion which the government said had already been allocated to ministries.

The list goes on and on.

Jubilee’s continued its signature insistence of fixing dire issues with cosmetic solutions. The First Lady, Margaret Kenyatta, organised an annual marathon to deal with maternal health care in the country. So far, reports indicate the project hasn’t been a success.

In 2016, Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission chairman Philip Kinisu spoke to Reuters about the issue.“The state budget is now approaching Sh2 trillion, a third of it is being wasted through corruption,” he said.

The Elephant itself has a very helpful guide pinpointing each and every major corruption scandal from 2013 to 2018.

By election time, we were monikered Uthamakistan, due to our relentlessness in calling Uhuru the chosen one. We lined up on that cold August morning believing that somehow the plunder would stop if we gave the “dynamic duo” a second term. Party primaries a few weeks prior had been chaotic, but we told ourselves that the “bad eggs” had been eliminated – it would get better.

It didn’t. Just after the announcement of the victory, Raila’s camp went to court to contest the victory. The ruling declared Uhuru’s win invalid. We were ordered back to the ballot on October 26th. The opposition wasn’t having it. They wanted complete electoral reform.

We rose up again less vocally this time, “Kwani you want a constitutional crisis?”

The most moderate of the uthamakistanis made a hollow concession that yes, the electoral process had been a mess. “Accept and move on,” they still said, before quickly adding, “but we understand where you’re coming from. IEBC really handled that poorly.”

After the October election, an eerie calm settled over the city. Things were either about to get a lot worse or marginally worse. They got worse. For a while, it became scary just to go out.

One Friday afternoon while I was at work, protests broke out in Kawangware 56, which is on my route home. A friend who was the same route called me to warn me off.

“Don’t use that route. Go to town or Westlands. There is chaos huku.”

“What is happening?” I asked, panic rising.

Street gangs from opposing camps had split the area in two, he said, and woe to you if you were caught on the wrong side.“Ukiwa hii side unaulizwa kama ulipiga kura. Na kama ulipiga wanakuchapa. Alafu ukienda terminus wanaangalia kama una rangi kwa kidole na kama hauna wanakuchapa.” (If you’re on this side, they ask you if you voted, and if you did they beat you up. And if you’re on the other side of the bus terminus, if they don’t see you voted by the ink on your finger, they beat you up.)

My friend told me he escaped any chaos because he had no ink and he is multilingual. No accent to betray him. No “special” features. Others didn’t fare so well.

Reports say that at least 10 people had died in Kawangware that day. Social media was inundated with messages demanding the local leaders to go cool the storming hotbed of violence. The last thing the country needed was more bloodshed. The violence lasted four days with the real number of victims remaining a mystery.

After 2017, I woke up and smelled the dead roses. However late, it happened. There wasn’t a particularly triggering event. But a subconscious harboring of anger and resentment that simply overflowed. I don’t yet know how to make peace with the fact that I had a hand in legitimising probably the worst administration this country has had the misfortune of enduring. I will never deserve that peace.

Shamefully, I recalled a correspondence I had with a friend during the 2017 election, when I exposed myself as a Jubilee supporter.

“Why are you voting for Uhuru?” he asked me.

I shrugged, and said the rote answers, “Let him finish his work. It’s difficult to beat the incumbent anyway. Raila isn’t a better option. Better the devil you know. ODM is so disorganised. There is no way they can lead this country to prosperity. At least Jubilee have done some development.”

“But he has had the most corruption scandals since Moi.”

“It’s not him, it’s the people around him.”

“But China…”

“Our debts to China won’t be repaid now. They’ll be repaid later.”

“But inflation…”

“That’s just the usual progression of an economy.”

“High cost of living, squandering government money, lower job security…”

“Aii kwani you want to vote for Raila?”

Then one day, the cognitive dissonance became impossible to bear. It all slammed into me like a truck with no brakes. How could I keep up this charade? How was I still capable of defending him? The administration had been rogue all along.

Last December, a video surfaced on Twitter in December 2018 tagged “Business Community Speaks”. A woman spoke to the camera, her voice betraying the anger and frustration most Kenyans felt.

“Tuna amka tunaskia mafuta imepandishwa,” she lamented, “Na tuli amka asubuhi kuchaguana… Nina mtoto mdogo nilimwacha kwa nyumbandio nikachague president… mwenye anaweza kututetea. Na saa hii hawajuisisi tunaelekea wapi.” (I heard this morning that fuel has become more expensive, yet we woke up early to vote. I left my baby in the house that day to vote for the president, someone who can defend us. But now, I don’t know what’s going to happen to us).

Thus far, a lot of the government’s actions have brought swift abandonment from their more resolute supporters. And the issues have been there all along, and they continue to intensify – hunger, extrajudicial killings, a failing healthcare system, a coal project in complete disregard to the environment, increased reports of femicide, and most recently, punishing whistleblowers. And we cannot call it corruption any more, as if the looting is an unfortunate outcome of an otherwise benign system – the plunder is the entire point. It is state capture.

I have no clue how any of this will be solved.

I wonder about an electoral boycott in 2022. Algeria has gone radical and conducted massive demonstrations forcing their president Abdelaziz Bouteflika to abandon his plans to run for a fifth term. Their transition won’t be easy. A caretaker government has been appointed to oversee the country until the next presidential election. Algerians want a clean slate. The military may have helped push for the resignation of their former leader but what role will they play in ensuring the protesters get what they were fighting for? It is still uncertain. Sudan also held protests for months to oust Bashir and ensure a transition of power conducted by civilians rather than the military.

So, what if not voting is the answer? What if, instead of going to queue to vote for fresh faces that make the same non-deliveries, Kenyans just didn’t show up to vote?

I ran this idea by a friend but he disagreed.

“Political parties are the ones with power. If you want to make change, you’d be better off showing up in droves to vote for the person you chose. You can vet the candidates during the primaries. And then make sure the best candidate is representing you.”

The idea of boycotts isn’t new. They have been used by civilians to show displeasure at the practices of those in power. Understandably, this may also have the added effect of enabling the status quo. Let’s call it a last resort; a drastic measure to be taken when there are no viable candidates to rally behind. Then again, the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955 was seminal event in the Civil Rights Movement in the US. The Anti-Apartheid Movement which led to boycotts of South Africa helped abolish apartheid in 1994.

The Kenyan constitution currently doesn’t have any provisions for extremely low voter turnout. But if people refused to show up, it would send an undeniable message. Thy will is not being done. There would be no added leverage of legitimacy. At the very least, it would establish a kind of controlled anarchy that would display an unwillingness to be taken for fools. While this may not provide an instant avenue to rebuilding a structure that is more acceptable to Kenyans, it may lay the groundwork to foster desired change.

With no visible grassroots organisation, an intrinsic fear for our lives and our livelihoods, perhaps the best solution at the moment, is not a nationwide gathering but a disappearance, one that won’t have consequences on jobs and lives. On that day of the vote, nobody goes.

There seems to be an unspoken truth that Kenyans are waiting for a “trigger”. The sayings punda amechoka (The donkey is exhausted) and Kenyans are tired keep being thrown around, to the point of becoming clichés. There is a simmering belief that at the right moment, the people will rise up and disenfranchise the hold Jubilee has over the people.

Still, going by the Huduma Number exercise, Kenyans are not keen on defying the government and they queued for hours to comply with the government directives. If a simple act of civil disobedience can’t be agreed upon, how can a revolution based on unified rebellion ever work?

Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

By John Githongo Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas By John Githongo

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: The Choices Facing Kenya and the Kenyattas

By John Githongo

The debut of this column in the E Review grappled with the Jubilee administration’s profligate spending. As it happens, dams were one of the big red flags that popped up. Records show that during its first term, the Jubilee administration spent upwards of KSh 160 billion on water and irrigation projects. These Arror and Kimwarer dams are costed at KSh 51 billion — let us say KSh 26 billion on average. The KSh 160 billion spent works out to at least six of these dams completed, or alternatively at least double that number under construction. And KSh 26 billion is a huge amount of money for a dam. Thika Dam, commonly known as Ndaka-ini, our biggest reservoir for drinking water to date, cost US$80 million in the early `90s, equivalent of US$140m (i.e. adjusted for dollar inflation) or KSh 14 billion today. These dam budgets are telling us that the cost of building dams has doubled in dollar terms, or that we are building infinitely grander dams. Neither is the case. We now know for sure that there were no dams built. This mindless plunder is replicated in virtually every sector. The budget records show KSh 280 billion on power transmission lines, enough for 6,000 kilometres of 400 Kv lines (based on the cost of Marsabit-Suswa line), but information posted by KETRACO, the agency responsible for building them, shows only 2800 km of lines under construction, whose total cost is at most KSh 100 billion. We are talking KSh 180 billion missing, an amount, I should add, of the same order of magnitude as the Eurobond money that the Auditor General could not find.

Overall, records show that KSh 2.5 trillion went through the development budget during Jubilee’s first term. The biggest ticket item here is the SGR railway which cost KSh 350 billion. The remaining KSh 2.15 trillion works out to KSh 45 billion worth of development projects per county. The money available to county governments over the same period would have enabled expenditure on average of KSh 6 billion on development projects. In effect, we should be seeing six times more national government development projects in each county as county government ones.

We now know for sure that there were no dams built. This mindless plunder is replicated in virtually every sector. The budget records show KSh 280 billion on power transmission lines, enough for 6,000 kilometres of 400 Kv lines …but information posted by KETRACO, the agency responsible for building them, shows only 2800 km of lines under construction, whose total cost is KSh 100 billion. We are talking KSh 180 billion missing, an amount, of the same order of magnitude as the Eurobond money that the Auditor General could not find.

Makueni county built a 200-bed Mother and Child hospital for a princely sum of Ksh. 135m. Kibra MP Ken Okoth built and equipped a girl’s secondary school that’s been all the rage for Ksh. 48m. A hospital like Makueni’s in every county is KSh 6.4 billion; a girls school like Kibra’s in every constituency, KSh 14 billion. Both combined add up to just over KSh 20 billion — about the money that has already been spent on the ghost dam projects. If national government has spent KSh 45 billion per county on development projects these two projects would not be the talk of the country. There would be the equivalent of 300 Mother and Child hospitals in every county or alternately, 150 Kibra girls schools in every constituency.

Galana-Kulalu Irrigation project is on its death-bed. It is not yet known how much money has gone down that drain. One senior Jubilee official said to me that it is their Goldenberg, to which I quipped that the competition for that dubious appellation would be strong. The last mile connectivity project was one of Jubilees flagship projects: over 800,000 connections are dormant. The connected households have never switched on the power. This should not surprise. Most of these households cannot afford electrical appliances other than a few lightbulbs that they would use only for three or four hours a day. It would have been infinitely more sensible and cost effective to mandate the Rural Electrification Authority to serve these rural hamlets with micro-grids and stand-alone domestic solar installations. The Kenya Power and Lighting Company (KPLC) is now weighed down with the costs of maintaining these loss-making connections. These costs have to be passed on to consumers. And this is over and above the costs of carrying the excess generation capacity courtesy of the equally hare-brained if-we-build-it-they will come 5000 MW drive that has now been abandoned. It has been a long climb for KPLC to recover from the plunder of the Moi regime.

Makueni County built a 200-bed Mother and Child hospital for the princely sum of KSh 135 million. Kibra MP Ken Okoth built and equipped a girl’s secondary school that’s been all the rage for KSh 48 million. A hospital like Makueni’s in every county is KSh 6.4 billion; a girls school like Kibra’s in every constituency, KSh 14 billion. Both combined add up to just over KSh 20 billion — about the money that has already been spent on the ghost dam projects.

This week, we have been entertained by the mysterious disappearance of 51 million litres of aviation fuel worth KSh 5 billion from the tanks of the Kenya Pipeline Company. This follows from a report that KPC lost 23 million litres worth Ksh 2.3 billion in 15 months. Even for the KPC, historically one of the most profitable and cash-rich public enterprises, a KSh 7 billion hole is a crippling loss. When Jubilee took over, the project on the table was to upgrade the 14-inch pipeline with a 16-inch one at a cost of KSh 16 billion. Jubilee scaled this up to a 20-inch one at a cost of KSh 48 billion, three times the mooted cost. The pipeline was to be completed in 18 months — by 2016 that is. Costs have escalated, and it is still not complete. It has been reported that the corruption investigation in KPC covers 27 projects worth KSh 95 billion. Most of this money is expensive foreign commercial loans. It’s hard to see how KPC can remain solvent. We are looking at another black hole here of the same order of magnitude as Kenya Airways, if not bigger.

The mother of all Jubilee financial blackholes is indisputably the SGR. According to Compass International, an engineering and construction consultancy, the benchmark cost for a new single- track high speed rail at between US$997,000 and US$ 1.13m per km, plus cost of signaling infrastructure at between US$154,700 and US$189,000 for a total of US$1.15 million to US$1.3 million The SGR is not an electrified high-speed rail, but we paid $6.7m per km, five times the high end of the benchmarking cost.

After years of denial, a government task force has established that the SGR is not viable. The SGR was sold on bringing down the cost, and improving the efficiency, of freight. According to the said task force, the SGR has increased the cost of transporting a 20-foot container by 118 percent, from $650 (Ksh. 65,000) by road, to US$1,420 (Ksh. 142,000) and by 149 percent for a 40-foot container from $850 (Ksh. 85,000) to US $2,120 (Ksh. 212,000).

There are two components in this cost escalation. First, the SGR tariff is set to try and repay the loans. Even then, the SGR is yet to cover operating costs, let alone generate an operating surplus that can service debt. Secondly, the SGR has introduced additional costs notably “last mile” cost of transporting containers from the railway terminal to the owners premises, as opposed to trucking which is port-to-door, as well as additional container handling logistics. These challenges of integrating rail and seaport are universal, and are part of the reason why the rail share of freight in the EU has declined from over 40 percent in the 70s to less than 20 percent today.

Even for the Kenya Pipeline Company, one of the most profitable and cash-rich public enterprises, a KSh 7 billion hole is a crippling loss. When Jubilee took over, the project…to upgrade the 14-inch pipeline with a 16-inch one at a cost of KSh 16 billion. Jubilee scaled this up to a 20-inch one at a cost of KSh 48 billion, three times the mooted cost. The pipeline was to be completed in 18 months – by 2016 that is. Costs have escalated, and it is still not complete. The long and short of it is that SGR is increasingly demonstrating what this columnist and others have maintained from the outset— that it is a white elephant. Without being forced, people would not use it. And if it were to charge a competitive tariff, it is doubtful that it would keep the trains running, let alone service its debt. I have opined before that the least costly option may be to mothball it, seeing as the debt will be paid by the taxpayer, we should not be made to pay four times namely, the debt, operational subsidy, higher freight cost and trucking industry jobs and incomes. The next best thing is to take over the debt, cancel the Chinese management contract and leave it to swim or sink in the market place under the management of Kenya Railways. The only beneficiary of this project is China. It is doubtful that the Jubilee administration can muster the resolve to bite the bullet on this one. So we will continue to bleed.

This is Uhuru Kenyatta’s legacy as it now stands. Mindless plunder and worthless vanity projects—a US$ 25 billion (Sh. 2.5 trillion) hole in the economy and counting, and contingent liabilities, financial booby traps if you like, Kenya Airways, Kenya Pipeline, Kenya Power and others we don’t know of yet, that could go off at any minute.

This is Uhuru Kenyatta’s legacy as it now stands. Mindless plunder and worthless vanity projects—a US$ 25 billion (Sh. 2.5 trillion) hole in the economy and counting.

The penny is beginning to drop, and sections of the regime are now beginning to talk about a turnaround strategy that can salvage the President something of an economic legacy. They have their work cut out. Economic crises of this nature are not solved by the same people who created them. Ethiopia’s EPDRF government came to this realisation about a year ago. Ethiopia was headed for a revolution such as unfolding next door in Sudan. Former Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn has recently intimated that he resigned to make it easier for the regime to reform. So far, the bet on a leadership change is paying off, even though the new Prime Minister’s magic touch is yet to be tested on the inevitable painful economic reforms. The political honeymoon also appears to be ending.

The rapprochement between Kenyatta and Raila Odinga a year ago, popularly known as the “handshake” offered an opportunity to engineer something similar. But as soon as they pledged to build bridges, Kenyatta set off to burn them. A year later, no-one seems to know where it is headed, other than hazy talk of a referendum, and holding the political ground as Kenyatta prosecutes yet another hypocritical and inept anti-corruption war, as opportunistic as it is ineffectual. With toxic succession politics in full throttle, it is difficult to see how resolve and focus on radical economic reform can be mustered.

Amidst the entire dam hullabaloo, there was a small event last week that did not attract much attention. The cornered Treasury CS took time out from his daily commute to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations to launch a private external audit of the Eurobond funds commissioned by the Treasury. No prizes for guessing that the audit sees no evil. External audit is an exclusive constitutional mandate of the Auditor General. We all witnessed the President staring down the Auditor General on his special audit ordered by parliament. It has yet to see the light of day. The national government’s audit for the year remains qualified. There is no country where questions can be raised about two billion dollars of public money, and the president of the country acts about it as nonchalantly as Kenyatta has, unless there is direct complicity with the thieves. Malaysia’s 1MDB and Mozambique’s Tuna sovereign bond frauds have unravelled. This one will too, in the fullness of time. Kenyatta has plenty of reason to want to extend his influence beyond his term of office.

To plunder the way the Jubilee administration has, it has had to raze the public financial management system to the ground. Without public financial accountability, there is no government, no economy, no country. To budget anything from a quarter to a third of the country’s annual GDP for stealing — to then borrow it, steal it, feign outrage, compromise parliament, and diffuse public anger with ineffectual corruption investigations, again and again and again – defies corruption. It is a crime against humanity.

Yes, the economy is crumbling, but its turnaround is not the priority. Getting rid of this monster called Jubilee is.

Published by the good folks at The Elephant.

The Elephant is a platform for engaging citizens to reflect, re-member and re-envision their society by interrogating the past, the present, to fashion a future.