Eric Omondi protest not a laughing matter; Kenyans are angry

On Tuesday, comedian Eric Omondi and a group of his fellow young activists were tear-gassed and arrested outside Parliament, in Nairobi, for seeking an audience with National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula. 

It was a largely peaceful protest that sought to draw Mr Wetang’ula’s attention to the mainly economic plight of ordinary Kenyans, with the ever-soaring cost of living as the major talking point. In the past six months or so, amid increasingly unfavourable weather conditions, Kenyans have been up against a precarious collective economic position.

The withdrawal of subsidies on essential commodities like maize flour and cooking gas by the new Kenya Kwanza regime, which also introduced punitive taxes, worsened the situation for ordinary Kenyans.

There are, of course, other issues that have seriously concerned Kenyans lately, such as the ongoing banditry scourge in the northwestern region. And yes, some of the issues Kenyans face, such as drought, are the socioeconomic outcomes of what may be called “acts of God”. 

But that doesn’t free the government from responsibility. It’s no licence for state officers, led by the President, to be and act deterministic, flippant and indifferent, fobbing the ordinary folk off with prayer while living in clover. 

Revolution 

Eric Omondi may have been joined by a small group of fellow Kenyans in ‘occupying’ Parliament on Tuesday. But he represents tens of millions of Kenyans who either may not have been available to join him in person or simply couldn’t muster as much chutzpah and bravery as his.

It should concern the government and, by extension, the entire ruling class that there are many ordinary Kenyans ready and willing to endure being tear-gassed and the indignities of police beatings and arrests to make a statement such as Eric Omondi and his colleagues perfectly did on Tuesday. 

The revolution that led to US’s independence from Britain began as a ‘small’ protest against “taxation without representation” in New England in 1775. In Tunisia in December 2010, it took the self-immolation of 26-year-old Mohammed Ali Bouazizi to spark the nationwide revolution that ousted President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali after 23 years in power.

Nothing is as disgusting—and more representative of unconcern—in the eyes of the people and God as deliberate unresponsiveness on the part of leaders. Not when the people are jobless, penniless, homeless, hungry, poor and choking on debt and taxes.

History shows it is such arrogance and incautious rhetoric as Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua’s “shareholder” lecture that ‘fires up’ the people and goads them into an insurrectionary mode. 

The 1789-1799 French Revolution probably wouldn’t have happened—at least not as gorily—had the rulers, led by King Louis XVI and his wife Marie Antoinette, not been as arrogant as to not care whether the people afforded the essentials.

It’s time President William Ruto’s government adopted a different modus operandi in the face of issues that afflict Kenyans. Else, it could soon be forced to confront the full horror of what the boldness of Eric Omondi and Co. portends: Revolution. 

Mr Baraza, a historian, is the author of ‘The Woman in the Messenger’s Jacket’. [email protected].