Weary and wary, Kenyans gear up for national elections

By Ayenat Mersie and Katharine Houreld

NAIROBI (Reuters) – East Africa’s financial powerhouse will maintain elections on Aug. 9 to pick a brand new president, parliament, county governors and assemblies. President Uhuru Kenyatta will likely be stepping down after serving his constitutionally allowed 10 years.

Many citizens need change, pissed off by corruption and skyrocketing costs. However each frontrunners vying to succeed Kenyatta have ties to him.

Veteran opposition chief Raila Odinga has acquired Kenyatta’s endorsement. William Ruto has been Kenyatta’s deputy president for the previous decade, though the 2 males fell out.

Odinga, a left-leaning former political prisoner, has served as prime minister and is the son of the nation’s first vp.

Ruto, a gifted orator who says he as soon as offered rooster by the roadside, has portrayed the election as a combat between widespread “hustlers” and elite “dynasties”.

Each are wooing voters in East Africa’s richest and most secure nation by promising to reign in ballooning overseas borrowing and assist the poor. Lower than 0.1% of Kenyans personal extra wealth than the underside 99.9% mixed, in response to Oxfam. The worldwide spike in gasoline and meals costs has hit households exhausting.

The candidates have additionally stitched collectively alliances of ethnic voting blocs. Such ethnic rivalries led to lethal violence in earlier elections after outcomes had been disputed.

However in contrast to the previous 4 elections, Kenyatta’s Kikuyu ethnic group, the nation’s largest, has no presidential candidate to unify behind. Each Odinga and Ruto have chosen Kikuyu vice-presidential working mates.

The potential fracturing of Kenya’s greatest ethnic voting bloc makes for an unpredictable election, mentioned Murithi Mutiga, Africa head for international assume tank Worldwide Disaster Group.

“The general public has grown weary of all of the byzantine alliances among the many political elites,” he mentioned. “Politicians are being compelled to debate points that actually matter.”

Younger residents are notably disenchanted, he mentioned; many haven’t bothered registering to vote.

VOTER APATHY

These are Kenyans like 30-year-old bike taxi driver Calvince Okumu, who falls right into a demographic courted by each camps.

He is among the nation’s 1.6 million motorbike taxi drivers – the sort of younger, hardscrabble entrepreneur Ruto guarantees to offer loans to. He additionally hails from Western Kenya, Odinga’s stronghold, and may gain advantage from his promise to supply a primary earnings to the poorest households.

He is not .

“Why ought to I line up for 4 hours to vote?” requested Okumu, a part-time pupil. “There is no distinction between the 2.”

The variety of registered voters aged 18-34 has dropped greater than 5 p.c because the 2017 election, regardless of inhabitants progress of round 12 p.c.

Okumu’s extra involved about discovering regular work. Greater than a tenth of Kenyans aged 18 – 64 are unemployed and almost one in 5 are out of the labor drive – which means they don’t seem to be searching for work, in response to the World Financial institution.

Endemic corruption has additionally angered voters; each camps embrace officers charged with and even convicted of corruption.

Within the northeast, the worst drought in 40 years has compelled parched grazing lands and compelled 4.1 million folks to rely on meals assist. Their plight has barely been talked about as would-be leaders buzzed throughout the nation in fleets of helicopters.

UNREST

The shadow of the violence following disputed 2007 elections, which killed 1,200 folks and displaced round 600,000, hangs over every election cycle.

Kenyatta and Ruto had been amongst six Kenyans charged on the Worldwide Legal Court docket over their alleged roles within the 2007 violence. Each denied the fees and their circumstances collapsed.

Violence additionally adopted the 2017 polls, when greater than 100 folks had been killed.

This time, there’s been much less pre-election violence; communities are working exhausting to defuse tensions. The Supreme Court docket’s resolution to nullify and re-run the final election additionally means there’s greater confidence within the justice system – so disputes usually tend to go to the courts than the streets.

(Modifying by Alexandra Hudson)