46 Middle East & Africa The Economist April 2nd 2022
KenyanpoliticsThe never-ending party
T
hepromises politiciansmake often
sound similar: more jobs, more roads,
few details. To understand their worldview
better, it can be illuminating to ask them
whom they admire.
William Ruto, Kenya’s deputy president
and a marginal favourite to win a presiden
tial election in August, tells The Economist
that he is inspired by Julius Nyerere, the
first president of Tanzania, and Margaret
Thatcher. It is an odd combination. One
destroyed Tanzania’s economy by nation
alising businesses and forcing people into
collective farms. The other transformed
Britain’s economy through privatisation.
In Tanzania, Mr Ruto explains, Nyerere
built “something that we are struggling to
build”: a national identity that overcame
tribal differences. Kenyan politics, by con
trast, have long been tribal and sometimes
violent. During the 1990s the Kalenjin
(those who speak a clutch of languages in
the Rift Valley) killed hundreds of Kikuyu
(Kenya’s largest tribe) to tilt the local elec
toral balance. Ethnic slaughter erupted
again after a disputed election in 2007.
More than 1,000 people died.
Mr Ruto, a Kalenjin who says he is
building a national party, not a tribal one,
may also be invoking Nyerere the uniter
because of his own reputation as a divider.
In 2013 the International Criminal Court
accused him of orchestrating the violence
in 2007. The case against him was never
proved. The court suspended the charges
(which he denies) after prosecution wit
nesses recanted or disappeared.
Thatcher is admired, he says, because
she came from a humble background. Mr
Ruto, who once sold fried chicken to mo
torists at a railway crossing, argues he is a
“hustler” like the poor whose votes he is
courting. He dismisses as “dynasts” his
main opponent, Raila Odinga, a son of
Kenya’s first vicepresident, and Mr Odin
ga’s main backer, the incumbent, Uhuru
Kenyatta, a son of Kenya’s first president.
Mr Ruto does, indeed, offer at least a
few echoes of the Iron Lady in his econom
ic policies. He wants to encourage the
growth of small businesses by cutting red
tape. But Mrs T would probably have
sniffed at much of his “bottomup eco
nomics” plan, which would subsidise fer
tilisers and cap interest rates.
If Mr Ruto’s economic policies seem
contradictory, they are not uniquely so. Mr
Odinga tells The Economistthat he takes inspirationfrom Lee Kuan Yew, who oversaw
Singapore’s astonishing economic suc
cess. The late Lee is a popular role model
among African leaders, many of whom ad
mire his tough style and achievements. Yet
few have emulated Lee’s personal disci
pline, willingness to curb corruption or
commitment to opening the economy. An
other of Mr Odinga’s idols is Narendra Mo
di, the prime minister of India. Mr Odinga
is impressed by how Mr Modi attracted in
vestment and spurred economic growth,
(though, one would hope, not by Mr Modi’s
religious chauvinism). Look in the mirror
Mr Odinga says he, too, wants to boost
growth and attract investment. Yet he is
going about it in an odd way. Like Mr Ruto,
he punts “bottomup economics” and sub
sidised fertiliser. He also wants to renego
tiate Kenya’s debt (which is about 70% of
gdp) with its external creditors. When
asked what are the main differences be
tween his platform and Mr Ruto’s, he sug
gests personalities, rather than policies. “I
stand for righteousness...and against cor
ruption,” Mr Odinga says. “My opponent is
basically the opposite of me.”
That both campaigns are so light on
policy is perhaps a reflection of the deep
cynicism pervading Kenyan politics. Mr
Odinga, who is making his fifth bid for
president, claims to have been cheated of
victory in Kenya’s three most recent elec
tions, starting with 2007, when Mr Ruto
was then his loyal chief lieutenant. In 2017
he claimed an electoral official had beenmurdered to facilitate a rigging of the
count that handed victory to Mr Kenyatta.
Yet since Mr Odinga forged an alliance
with President Kenyatta in 2018, he no lon
ger asks questions about the murdered of
ficial. Nor has he sought justice for the
scores of his supporters who were shot
dead by the police after he called for prot
ests against the outcome of the election.
This cynicism seems to percolate down
to the electorate, too. When in February Mr
Kenyatta endorsed Mr Odinga, once his
bitterest rival, and denounced Mr Ruto, his
deputy for the past ten years, Kenyans
barely turned a hair. “Politics in Kenya is
like looking through a kaleidoscope,”
grumbles a Western diplomat. “The bits are
still the same but every time you shake it
they form different patterns.”
One reason for it may be that electoral
contests are not ideological sparring
grounds. Instead many voters still cast
their ballots on ethnic lines. Few political
parties survive more than one electoral cy
cle. “Political parties are singlepurpose
vehicles,” designed solely to catapult their
leaders to power, says David Ndii, an eco
nomic adviser to Mr Ruto. Mr Odinga has
belonged to six political parties, Mr Ruto to
five and President Kenyatta to four. As a re
sult, there is usually little to distinguish
presidential candidates from each other.
The unpalatable choice before Kenyans
may explain why this election is likely to
be characterised by indifference. Apathy is
preferable to violence, but it is still corro
sive and leads to stagnation. The Kenya Af
rican National Union (kanu) was once the
country’s only legally permitted political
party, ruling from 1963 until 2002.
In every single election since then the
winners and runnersup, as well as all their
key lieutenants, have been former card
carrying members of kanu. No new politi
cal party has been able to break through.
Kenya has manyparties on paper. Yet it still
bears the imprintof its corrupt old one
party system.nN AIROBI
Kenyan voters face an invidious choice in August