Kenya's Fight Against Corruption
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MARCH 15, 2007 ● no. 2 Kenya’s Fight against Corruption An Uneven Path to Political Accountability by John Githongo Executive Summary emocratic elections in Kenya in 2002 were sup- But there are hopeful signs in Kenya and other parts posed to have heralded a period of intense political of Africa. The end of Daniel arap Moi’s autocratic rule Dand economic reform. At the start of its term in reinvigorated the democratic forces in the country. The office, the government of Mwai Kibaki did undertake a young generation especially treats Kenya’s politicians number of important reforms, including the creation of a with growing skepticism, and civil society and the media special unit tasked with overseeing the fight against cor- are increasingly active in exposing corruption and mis- ruption and fraud. Unfortunately, the reform process soon rule there. The process of public awakening is not partic- ran into trouble. The governing coalition disintegrated and ular to Kenya. Globalization and technological change factional strife reemerged—much of it along ethnic lines. are having noticeable empowering effects on African The government’s commitment to reduce the power of the youth. With growing frequency, demands for account- presidency was soon abandoned. Moreover, grand-scale ability and a better government are being heard through- corruption accompanied the end of the reform process. out the continent. John Githongo is the former permanent secretary for governance and ethics in the Office of the President of Kenya and a senior associate member of St. Antony’s College, Oxford University. This paper is based on a talk given at the Cato Institute on March 29, 2006. the cato institute 1000 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W., Washington D.C. 20001-5403 www.cato.org Phone (202) 842-0200 Fax (202) 842-3490 The 1990s saw an Kenya’s new president, Mwai Kibaki. The unleashing of Introduction process of institutionalizing the resultant Kenyan anti-corruption commission as the pre- many freedoms, In December 2002, the National Rainbow mier anticorruption agency was completed at which changed Coalition (NARC) came to power in Kenya as the end of 2004. the way in which a result of democratic elections. That event The government also established the Kenya ended 24 years of a stifling autocratic rule by National Commission on Human Rights, cre- Africans see Daniel arap Moi and his Kenya African ated a specialized cabinet committee on cor- themselves. National Union (KANU). Moi had ceded ruption, and institutionalized the declaration democratic space with reluctance and in bad of assets and liabilities by public officials after faith. He had gone to every length to confuse; passing the Public Officer Ethics Act in 2003. bribe; intimidate; and, at times, injure or In addition, the Goldenberg Commission of eliminate the forces of change in the 1990s. Enquiry was established to get to the bottom One of the most important developments of the Goldenberg scandal of the early 1990s, that came as a result of the peaceful transi- in which corrupt government officials hood- tion at the end of 2002 was the entrenchment winked the Kenyan taxpayer out of approxi- and further expansion of democratic space mately US$1 billion. The Commission on that had been fought for and won bitterly Illegal and Irregular Allocation of Public Land over the past few decades. Kenyans had not and the National Anti-Corruption Campaign so much voted for this or that party. Rather, were established, as was the Task Force on they voted for change. They voted for a Truth, Justice, and Reconciliation, with the change in the way they were governed and aim of ascertaining public opinion as to hoped for a more accountable and transpar- whether a truth commission should be set up. ent government. They were tired of the old There was also a dramatic reform of the judi- order and wanted something new, something ciary that saw 50 percent of the top judges better. They were also excited that, at the last removed from office. minute, the opposition had finally united. That hunger for change was not a uniquely Kenyan phenomenon. Across the African The Coalition Begins continent similar expectations of change to Unravel were coalescing and continue to do so. It is important to note that all the reforms discussed above were initiated within the first The National Rainbow nine months of the Kibaki administration. Coalition Undertakes Unfortunately, disagreements over the consti- Important Reforms tutional review process, the powers of the pres- idency, and the inability to agree on the post of Within months of the election, the new the prime minister splintered the NARC coali- administration had embarked on an ambitious tion. Virtually overnight, NARC became dys- program of reform that included, among other functional, with the Liberal Democratic Party measures, the creation of a Ministry of Justice (LDP) pitted against the National Alliance and Constitutional Affairs, my own appoint- Party of Kenya (NAK). The constitutional ment as the permanent secretary in charge of reform process of 2003 culminated in the governance and ethics, and the appointment of November 2005 referendum on the proposed a new director of public institutions, who was constitution. The referendum became an charged to create a special unit to address cor- arena in which the internal disagreements ruption, serious crime, fraud, and asset forfei- within the coalition were played out. ture. The Anti-Corruption and Economic Those disagreements could have been Crimes Act of 2003 was signed into law by anticipated, since in the immediate after- 2 math of the single-party state in 1991, the to look as though the state was dominated by oppositions splintered along ethnic lines. “Cold Warriors” seeking to impose their Individual parties drew support from partic- 1970s political ideals on the new realities ular areas dominated by specific ethnic around them. groups that were mobilized along tribal lines by individual leaders on the basis of their past, present, and future promises of deliver- Young People Are ing more political patronage. It was such a Changing Africa splintering of the political elite—encouraged enthusiastically by the then-ruling party— But the Cold War had ended. Young peo- that characterized politics between 1992 and ple—influenced by television, radio, the 2002. The unification of the opposition Internet, and mobile phones—who now make behind Mwai Kibaki and under the NARC up a majority of the population, do not banner managed to push KANU out of remember Jomo Kenyatta—except for what power, but that unity was temporary. they read about him. In the cities, the young As the disagreements within the coalition generation speaks its own language, “Sheng,” deepened, some members of the leadership which is a combination of English and wanted to preserve NARC as one political Kiswahili. They are less deferential toward Technological entity. They argued that since NARC had their leaders than their parents were. They are interconnected- contested the election as a single party, it better educated and more exposed to the ness has height- should remain together and be further world than any preceding generation. There strengthened. Others argued that the NARC are both negative and positive aspects of those ened expectations coalition had come together to remove developments. These changes hold true—in among the young. KANU from power. Now that KANU had varying degrees—for the whole of Africa. been defeated, there was no need for NARC’s Moreover, the relevance of Africa’s former unity to continue. development partners and of foreign aid has The first, “centralizing” group of leaders declined since the end of the Cold War. That harked back to the era of the 1960s and 70s, was in part the result of the West’s disengage- when the Kenyan economy grew under the ment from directly supporting the corrupt authoritarian rule of President Jomo Kenyatta. central government and its support for civil Their view was based on an implicit, and ulti- society in the 1980s and 1990s. Other factors mately destructive, notion that Kenyatta’s leading to the decline of Western influence in Kikuyu tribe and the associated communities Africa included reduction of the government’s possessed the capacity to get the economy mov- capacity to absorb aid, improved tax collection ing again after a period of prolonged incompe- that decreased Africa’s reliance on foreign aid, tence, looting, and resulting stagnation. That and the rise of political correctness that saw implicit organizing idea around which many conditional lending as “imperialistic.” members of the ruling elite coalesced manifest- The 1990s saw an unleashing of many free- ed itself in a number of ways, including, for doms, which changed the way in which example, with regard to early appointments of Africans see themselves. In particular, there senior public officials, including myself. emerged a more confident urban population, More destructively, it manifested itself in which, while acknowledging the shortcom- the arrogance of those who believed that the ings of life in Africa, also feels an affinity with Kikuyu tribe would produce economic urban young around the world. That is espe- growth and be allowed some “excesses” in cially true with respect to access to informa- return. That was a model that was reasonably tion, for technological interconnectedness has successful during the Cold War and had only heightened expectations among the young. started to falter in the mid 1980s, when the Today, African governments have to be sensi- Moi regime consolidated. By 2004, it began tive to those expectations or risk political 3 crises. Consequently, foreign aid, although using a mixture of some real reforms, public still important to those countries that receive relations, and dubiously financed political budgetary support and infusions of emer- patronage. The second option turned out to gency aid to mitigate natural disasters, might be more familiar and, perhaps, easier.