NAIROBI, Kenya— Kenyans disaffected with President William Ruto hold placards proclaiming “WANTAM,” a sensational slogan distilling their efforts to disgrace him as a “one-term” leader. They stick their index fingers in the air, saying Ruto must vacate the presidency when his term expires in 2027. For others who want him gone only three years after he was elected, even that’s a long time.
Kenya’s fifth president became a remarkably unpopular leader barely two years into his presidency after proposing aggressive tax measures that many saw as a betrayal of his campaign promise to support working-class people. Ruto said new taxes were necessary to keep the government running.
Protests intensify
Ruto survived the tax-protest movement last year as thousands of young people took to the streets in an unsuccessful attempt to force his resignation. In the most violent incident that left at least 22 people dead, protesters sacked and attempted to burn the parliamentary building in the capital, Nairobi. Ruto said that would never happen again.
Ruto now faces a new wave of protests provoked most recently by the death of a blogger in police custody. Many Kenyans saw the incident as symptomatic of bad rule in Kenya, with the president firmly in control of the legislature and security apparatus.
“He has control of the institutions, but he doesn’t have control of the people,” said Karuti Kanyinga, an analyst and professor of development studies at the University of Nairobi. He noted Ruto suffers such “a low level of public confidence” that he is probably the most hated man in Kenya.
Ruto likely will stay in power until 2027, but “violence will continue to deepen” as young people, opposition politicians and others try to make an example of him in an escalating campaign to reform Kenya’s government, Kanyinga warned.
Public discontent
Protesters say they want to rid the government of corruption, marked by theft of public resources and the seemingly extravagant lifestyles of politicians. Some disparage Ruto as “Zakayo,” referring to the biblical tax collector Zacchaeus, and others call him “mwizi,” Kiswahili for thief.
The demonstrators also are inflamed by what they see as incessant deal-making under Ruto, who last year was forced to terminate an agreement worth an estimated $2 billion that would have seen Kenya’s main airport controlled by the Indian conglomerate Adani Group.
That deal, which became public months after security forces violently quelled anti-tax protests, reignited public discontent and reinforced a view of Ruto as unrepentant and unwilling to listen to his people.
To a degree rare for an African leader, Ruto constantly speaks about efforts to expand the tax base. His negotiations for new debt with the International Monetary Fund have drawn criticism from those who say proposed reforms will hurt poor people while benefitting politicians and the business class.
Last year, he told Harvard Business School’s Class of 2025 that he wasn’t going to preside over “a bankrupt country.”
Protesters are “not feeling heard and there’s a sense that things have not really changed since the protests last year,” said Meron Elias, an analyst in Kenya with the International Crisis Group. “There’s a lot of grief and bitterness from last year’s protest that is also feeding into current tensions.”
