By John Walubengo
It started as a protest against the punitive Kenya Finance Bill of 2024, but it has evolved and continues to evolve into something yet to be defined. What exactly does the youthful generation want?
The hashtags read #RutoMustGo but everyone knows the issues are deeper than replacing one regime with another – as we have been democratically and religiously doing without fail since independence.
To understand what the youth want, we must first understand what this unique difference between the generation ‘Z’ aka GenZ is of today (below 30), and their older GenY (between 30-45) and much older Gen Xs (over 45).
The GenX struggles
Truth be told, each of the above generations has had its moments. The GenXs were on the frontline of the battle against the draconian Moi regime in the early 1990s and returned Kenya to its multiparty democracy at quite a great cost of sacrifice.
The tool of trade at the time for the 1990s GenXs was rudimentary in terms of mobilization, coordination and execution of what has come to be termed the second liberation – the first being the independence struggle.
There was only one radio station, one TV station both of whom were fully owned by the Government. There were three daily newspapers, one of which was a KANU mouthpiece and practically no internet.
GenXs therefore had to organize around leading political personalities with significant resources (money, logistics, underground networks) to not only get the message to the masses through analogue means, but also to get them out, and keep them on the streets over a long period.
Whereas the GenX struggles gave birth to multiparty politics, it was soon clear to everyone that having multiparty without fundamental changes in the way the state is structured and governed would not deliver the desired results.
The GenY struggles
At the turn of the millennium, the opposition decided to unite and bring down the KANU regime that had ruled and cast a dark shadow over the country for over forty long years since independence.
It was a pivotal moment in 2002, when the Kibaki regime took over and some global ‘happiness index’ even recorded Kenya at the time, as being the happiest country on the planet.
There was a palpable feeling of hope, change and transformation in the streets of Kenya, with many Kenyan citizens going as far as doing ‘citizen arrests’ of policemen trying to extort bribes, #Occupying KICC, the then HQ of KANU to reclaim it back to the public, amongst other wishful thinking acts of patriotism.
For some reason, this was short-lived as the Kibaki regime slid back to default settings of tribalism, and negative ethnicity in the face of relentless internal rebellion mounted by the then Raila part of the coalition – arising from some unfulfilled secret MoU between the two coalition partner.
By the time Kenya went into the 2007 general election, the country was well prepared to go into its darkest moments of civil strife that left over two thousand Kenyans dead over what is currently known as the tribal Post Election Violence (PEV) of 2007.
Whereas the Kibaki regime quashed the 2002 euphoria and failed to unite the country, it used that PEV crisis to give the country what is considered one of the best constitutions in the world – the Kenya 2010 Constitution.
Additionally, the Kibaki regime excelled in laying the foundation of the digital information superhighway by laying submarine cables, liberalizing the ICT sector and creating Kenya’s first ‘digital natives’– the current GenZ generation.
This is the lens through which one must understand the current GenZ struggle. The country is dealing with a very enlightened generation, powered largely by internet tools and technologies and the 2010 Constitution.
Knowing very well that Article 1 of the 2010 constitution states that ‘All sovereign power belongs to the people of Kenya and shall be exercised only in accordance with this Constitution’ the GenZ struggle reminds and asks the political elite to follow the Kenyan Constitution.
The provisions of Chapter 6 on Leadership and Integrity whose Article 73 states in part, that Authority assigned to a State Officer is a public trust to be exercised in a manner that—
(i) is consistent with the purposes and objects of this Constitution;
(ii) demonstrates respect for the people;
(iii) brings honour to the nation and dignity to the office; and
(iv) promotes public confidence in the integrity of the office; and
(b) vests in the State officer the responsibility to serve the people, rather
then the power to rule them.
I submit that that is the endgame the GenZs are looking for. Anything else will be a sideshow that may not resolve an internet-driven uprising where the barriers to mobilize, communicate and execute are very low and easily surmountable– as compared to what the previous GenX, and GenY struggles faced.
John Walubengo is an ICT Lecturer and Consultant. @jwalu.
Photo Frank Omondi
