Post-Pandemic World View
The unprecedented spread of COVID-19 plunged the world into a lot of problems and led to many short-term and long-term crises but the story doesn’t stop there. The world was barely out of the threat of the pandemic when Russia invaded Ukraine. The war, which is still ongoing, negatively impacted the pre-existing crisis. It caused harm to the global economy, trade, food security, and climate, and affected the cost of living in general.
The world inflation rate went up from 1.9% to 8.8%, which in turn increased the number of people living in extreme poverty from 100 million to 700 million. Developing and underdeveloped nations like Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and a bunch of African countries were hit the most due to these crises. Some countries were dragged into extreme poverty, some defaulted, and others narrowly escaped default.
Kenyan Condition: An aerial perspective
Kenya is no different than the countries mentioned above. Kenya is located in East Africa and like most of the world, it was also once colonized. When the colonizers left the country in 1963, the nation’s economy was in shambles. The post-independence struggle of building the country, economically and politically, from the ground aggravated the problem.
Political instability and ethnic violence became the fate of the nation after independence. It took Kenya years to achieve some economic progress mainly due to foreign aid, foreign investments, and Kenya’s tourism industry, but it didn’t help much. As of late, almost two-thirds of the nation’s population is impoverished.
Kenya’s economy was doing significantly better before COVID-19 and it was able to reach the status of a lower-middle-income country. It was growing at a pace of 5.9 percent annually until 2018, making it one of the most rapidly growing economies in Africa. The Kenyan economy went into great shock after COVID-19. Navigating through COVID-19, Kenyan GDP growth fell from 6.3 percent to 5.6 percent in 2019.
As a result, the government decided to retract the tax relief measures that were being provided to the citizens earlier. Henceforth, the cost of living was increased and the unemployment rate became high in the country. An even greater blow was felt by the Kenyan economy after Russia invaded Ukraine. Its agriculture sector shrunk by 1.5 percent which adversely affected GDP growth even more. The road to economic recovery became even more rocky when the global inflation rate went up and global and domestic financial conditions contracted.
Kenya’s Current Plight
Kenyan citizens are quite unhappy with the current administration of President William Ruto. His presidential campaign was mainly based on providing relief to ordinary Kenyans who work hard to make ends meet. He even identified himself as a “hustler,” much like the majority of the citizens, to gain people’s trust and votes. He also vowed to fix the country’s economy by upholding the rule of law.
However, after coming to power, it looks as if he has forgotten all his promises to the “ordinary” citizens. In fact, the economic conditions have deteriorated even further under his watch. Right after taking charge, he was quick to renounce the food and fuel subsidies given to Kenyans by the previous administration. This abrupt slashing of subsidies led to violent protests by the people and therefore led to the restoration of the small subsidy on fuel.
This reinstating of subsidies didn’t sit right with the IMF and its conditionalities for its structural adjustment programs for emerging economies. The IMF strongly criticized the Kenyan president’s decision to restore the subsidy. Consequently, when the budget for the year 2024–25 was presented, the administration decided to increase the tax on commodities, which, once again, meant an even higher cost of living for the citizens.
Through these additional taxes on bread, motor vehicles, cooking oil, financial and bank services, etc., the government plans to raise an additional $2.7 billion in taxes. According to President Ruto, the country is not paying sufficient taxes, and to reduce the nation’s debt and sustain the economy, more and more taxes should be collected from the people.
The Anti-tax Protests
These additional taxes, if implemented, could add to the plight of poverty-ridden Kenyans. Therefore, the citizens, mainly the youth of the country, took to the streets to demonstrate their unwillingness to pay hefty taxes amid the economic crisis in the country. The anger that is said to have started on a social media platform turned into a full-fledged protest when Gen-Z (the youth) came out on the streets.
According to these demonstrators, the citizens are already bearing the burden of being overtaxed, and those taxes are not benefiting the taxpayers; rather, they’re worsening their conditions. The protesters demanded that some of these newly proposed taxes not be implemented and that they reject the proposed finance bill for 2024–25. Some of the protesters are even demanding the resignation of the president.
The protests, currently going on in the 19 counties of Kenya, turned violent after clashes were reported between the police and the citizens. Many people have been reported injured and several have been arrested till now. Although it was initially thought that the protesters would be easily silenced after facing police brutality, it turned out to be quite the opposite.
It has turned into a massive revolt not only on the streets but also on various social media platforms so much so that the government decided to discard some of the newly proposed taxes. The items from which the additional taxes were scrapped include bread, cooking oil, motor vehicles, packaging items, plastic, and tyres.
This anti-tax protest is one of its kind and a demonstration that has never been seen before in Kenya. It is not only led by the youth of the country but also the first time in the history of the country that no ethnic differences have come between the causes. All the citizens, no matter what their ethnic identity is, have joined hands to express their dissatisfaction over the finance bill. These protests were also quite peaceful, unlike any previous protests, until the police used violence on the demonstrators.
The violence from the police initially involved the use of tear gas, water cannons, and batons against the protesters. They also arrested hundreds of protesters while they were out on the streets. Things took an ugly turn when one of the demonstrators was killed by the police. After this incident, the demonstrators have turned ferocious and they too are resorting to violence. On June 25th 2024, people entered the Kenyan Parliament building and set a part of the building on fire to show their anger and disappointment. Consequently, the police unleashed a brutal response that has now killed 13 people. The protest that started in Nairobi is now spreading in the rest of the country as well.
Is the IMF to Blame?
Since the public outcry is to such a large extent, the government has to give in to some of their demands. However, it is impossible for the government to cut off all the additional taxes because of the IMF’s stringent conditions for Kenya for a loan pay-out. It can also be said that these additional taxes were proposed in the first place to comply with the IMF conditions. If the government fails to revoke the additional taxes, it will not only raise the cost of living but also cause a rise in unemployment and push more people towards substandard living and poverty.
One cannot deny that the IMF is pushing more and more people towards poverty in the nations that are already poor. Its rigid conditions violate human rights in many third-world countries. These protests show that Kenyans want to rise above these problems and want the government to look out for its people rather than the West.
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Hareem Amna graduated with a degree in applied psychology from GCUF and a post-graduation certification in clinical psychology from Kinnaird College. She is an aspiring writer focused on writing about current issues.