Why Nigerians Must Emulate Kenyans
A good number of people in power consider the masses as frail, weak, and incapable of standing for their rights. This has been true to a reasonable extent on the African continent, where the poor masses are contemptuously living in masochism. One would wonder whether the rise of Kenyan youth against the anti-people policy of the Kenyan government will ever happen successfully in Nigeria.
It may not be that the education of the Kenyan people is different from the education of Nigerians, nor may it be that the Kenyan people are suffering less than Nigerians. What is plausible is that the Kenyan youth have attained consciousness and have paid a supreme sacrifice to demand that the government remains the government of the people and not anti-people. The only reason why we live is that basic necessities of life are meant for all, and if the basic necessities of life are no longer for all, then there is no reason for life. I feel the vicarious pain our Kenyan comrades are facing and the nightmares the families of the fallen heroes are going through. The Nigerian youth too had their share of unforgettable pain during the EndSARS protest, and we can only pray that the fallen heroes rest with the greats.
When Ngugi Wa Thiong’o wrote about decolonizing the mind, he had these moments of safe consciousness and safe liberation in mind. George Orwell is profoundly right to have said that “Until they become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious.” It is the consciousness of man’s dignity and rights that tells you that all men are created equal and the governments are only servants that are meant to lead. It is not history that reminds a people that they ought to live a better life, nor is it history that teaches a people rebellion. What is certain is that when a people have been made to live in existential crisis and economic torment, rebellion is the only way out.
What then is wrong with Nigeria? On May 29, 2023, President Tinubu sacrificed Nigerians on the altar of the IMF by introducing masochism with the removal of fuel subsidies and subsequent hike in tax for basic necessities like power units. Yet, the Nigerian people only mumbled in defeat. Inflation is at a historic high with no sign of remedy in sight. Still, the Nigerian people are content to be surviving.
Though Kenya is a country with a long history of protests, mass protests took place during the colonial period and continued in the post-independence era. Like Nigeria, significant democratic gains were achieved through protests, such as the introduction of multi-party politics in 1991 and the violent clampdown that followed the disputed 2007 elections, which left more than 1,100 dead. The significance of this year’s protests is that the protesters are predominantly led by young people who are urban-based and multi-ethnic and have not been confined to the capital, Nairobi alone. 35 of Kenya’s 47 counties witnessed street protests. This means that 74 percent of Kenyans witnessed and perhaps participated in protests this year.
The Kenyan government agreed to a US$2.34 billion loan with the International Monetary Fund in April 2021 to address funding shortfalls related to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and existing national debt. Conditions of this loan included government reform, value-added tax increases, removal of subsidies, and expansion of the tax base under the guidance of the IMF and World Bank in the 2023 Finance Bill. The 2024 Finance Bill included a 16% value-added tax on bread and the transportation of sugar cane, a 15% to 40% value-added tax on financial services and foreign exchange transactions, a 16% value-added tax on imported table eggs, onions, and potatoes, an increase from 15% to 20% in the excise tax on mobile money transfer charges, a 25% excise duty on vegetable oil which, according to the Kenyan Association of Manufacturers, could have spiked the price of soap by 80%, a tax on motor vehicle owners requiring them to annually pay 2.5% of their car’s value, with a minimum of KSH 5,000 and a maximum of KSH 100,000, and an "Eco Levy", aiming to stop pollution and excess waste at the office/household level, which affects diapers, batteries/dry cells, smartphones, earphones, clocks, radios, TV sets, and cameras, as well as plastic packaging materials and a variety of other products.
According to Kuria Kimani, chairman of Kenya’s Finance and National Planning Committee, the proposed tax increases that were scrapped included a 16% value-added tax (VAT) on bread, as well as taxes on motor vehicles, vegetable oil, and mobile money transfers. This did not satisfy protesters, who demanded that the entire bill be abandoned.
Using state machinery like the Army and the Police is not a new phenomenon for governments in a bid to repress any uprising. Whenever governments do this, the anomy is always tagged as criminal elements within the ranks of the protesters. It was the same story in Nigeria’s 2020 EndSARS protest where the Army shot at protesters in Lagos. Far from police brutality, can Nigerians ever ask questions about their state of being?
One would wonder whether the Kenyan youth that died for the survival of the poor masses of Kenya never knew the tribes from which they were coming. Sadly, the story is different in Nigeria. Ethnic jingoists, as W.B. Yeats puts it, “are full of passionate intensity” in defending their own once in power. Before the 2015 election, there were cries from the northern and western regions of Nigeria about Jonathan’s poor handling of insecurity and corruption. When Buhari came on board and insecurity, hardship, and corruption became astronomical, the North went quiet. Now that it is President Tinubu’s time, the West are acquiescent and the voices from the North are louder.
Nigeria is not the only country with different ethnic groups, but one would wonder why the tribal phenomenon is such a dead-or-alive issue. Chinua Achebe tried to answer this when he wrote that “Nothing in Nigeria’s political history captures her problem of national integration more graphically than the chequered fortune of the word tribe in her vocabulary. Tribe has been accepted at one time as a friend, rejected as an enemy at another, and finally smuggled in through the back door as an accomplice.” Instead of Nigeria trying to move away from the tribal inclination, we have been presented with a constant reminder that we are of a different tribe as President Tinubu returned the old national anthem composed by a British woman. So, our national anthem reminds us daily that “Though tribe and tongue may differ, in brotherhood we stand!” If the return of the old anthem is not a propaganda tactic by the ruling elite to delude the people into an unending trap of subjugation, why bring an anthem that serves only a political purpose?
It is a degree of our self-delusion that we can talk about brotherhood in Nigeria. Only a masochist with an exuberant taste for self-violence and aggrandizement will say that tribe has not exterminated our national growth. Listen to Nigerian politicians and you will always hear the phrase “this great country of ours.” However, I contend that Nigeria cannot be a great nation as tribes and religions have colonized its people. It is among the world’s most chaotic countries. It is among the most crooked, callous, and ineffective locations on earth. It’s among the most costly nations and among those with the lowest value for the money. It is vulgar, ostentatious, boisterous, cruel, and dishonest. Put simply, it’s one of the worst places on the planet for the poor to live.
Surprisingly, the youth in Kenya protested in most of the country’s towns despite the fact that Kenya equally has multiple ethnic groups. The poor masses all over the world must have one word in mind, which is resistance. Thomas Jefferson had told us that “when injustice is made the order of the day, resistance must be made a duty.” The Kenyan people protested against William Ruto’s finance bill because the consequences of the bill respect no tribe nor religion. The inflation in Nigeria does not care about the tribe and religion of the buyer. The Nigerian masses have become the forgotten victims of the cruel capitalist policies of the government, yet we have tribe and religion hung as badges to excuse our docility.
We must stand up for the youth of Kenya for standing up against Ruto’s IMF deal and encourage others to do so. Exploitation and oppression are above our wish, but protest and resistance are always within our reach. No responsible government removes subsidies on essential commodities. Subsidies are done all over the world, even in countries that are in the belly of capitalism. Nigerians must, as a matter of urgency, look inward for their liberation.
