As an unemployed Gen Z who is almost hopeless after a year of job searching and fruitless attempts at self-employment, most of your time is spent on social media. A day spent scrolling through X, Instagram, and Tik Tok will give you every reason to go to the streets to protest against an oppressive regime that displays the highest level of chicanery. A regime that has turned you, a Gen Z in their soft boy era, into a revolutionary. Yes, many might have thought that you are delulu, lazy, and that you do not care about what is happening in the country. But after hours of flipping through TV channels watching live broadcasts of what is going on in Kenya, you have concluded that enough is enough. For a baddie to take to the streets to protest, mambo imechemka! However, before you join fellow Kenyans for the #RejectFinanceBill2024, you must inject a dose of the necessary information. Legal and tax experts have broken down the Finance Bill for easy consumption. Your fellow Gen Zs have shared this information on social media, creating key points to know, and talking points if you are approached by the media. Now that you are ready, you get a mask, a whistle, a placard, and toothpaste, and off you go into the centre of Nairobi to join the peaceful maandamano.
Civic education is playing a significant role in creating a Gen Z citizenry that is effective, responsible, and informed. Their intellectual and participatory skills were in evidence, especially during the organisation of the protests, from fundraising to supporting those who could not make it to the protests, to paying bills for those injured or killed by the police, to offering food and shelter. They took measures to ensure that protesters knew their rights, understood why they were protesting, and had a code of conduct to follow during the maandamano and when they were arrested. Moreover, the heavy presence of Gen Zs on social media made it easy to share this information virally such that even those who could not protest in person would continue with online activism, pushing the hashtags, reposting, and resharing critical information.
The Uraia The Citizen Handbook states that the core of civic education is to turn citizens into active participants in governance and political processes. Uraia emphasises that civic education “informs community members of government development plans and their contribution to ensure the implementation of the plan is successful” and helps “citizens challenge the necessity or legitimacy of specific government policies and actions”. This way, they can support the development of their country or question the government if they feel the plans are not going as desired.
Symbolic nature of Kenya’s citizen participation
I suppose the reason why most Kenyans were against the government’s calls for dialogue following the protests was the realisation that even with their public participation, nothing much had changed since the government of the day ascended to power. In her journal article “A Ladder of Citizen Participation”, American author Sherry Phyllis Arnstein explores the levels of citizen participation in governance. She argues that while we may seem like we are actively participating in decision-making, the power is with those who represent us. The ladder of citizen participation categorises citizen involvement into three stages: Non-participation (manipulation and therapy), tokenism (informing, consultation, and placation), and citizen power (partnership, delegate power, and citizen control).
Arnstein argues that at the non-participation stage, citizens are lured to believe that they are participating in decision-making; for instance, being invited to organised events yet their involvement does not affect the outcome. In the middle stage, tokenism, power holders explain policies to the citizens so that they can share their input but whatever input the citizens provide does not have any effect on the decisions taken. Lastly, at the citizen power level, the citizens have more power in decision-making, where they can either get more representation in government or run, partly or fully, a government initiative or programme. While this model has limitations, as Arnstein puts it, it gives a glimpse of what exactly happens during public participation. One of the limitations is that different groups and subgroups have different agendas when participating in governance whereas, on the other hand, power holders could be lying that our voices matter, when indeed they do not listen. This shows how citizen participation is more symbolic than it is a reality.
When protesters took to the streets in the #RejectFinanceBill2024 demonstrations, they were practising their constitutional right to assemble, demonstrate, and picket. It is one thing to know and practise a right, but another to be ignored and dismissed by those in power. The pressure from the demonstrators across the country eventually forced the president, William Ruto, to withdraw the Finance Bill 2024 and open his doors to dialogue. But to build anything meaningful now that the Finance Bill 2024 has been withdrawn, we must have a calculated and strategic plan to ensure accountability. In the powerful words of American political philosopher and activist Martin Luther King Jr’s speech, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.” That while we protest, we can maintain the peace that we started out with, and that the government can respect our right to protest.
The very core of keeping the revolution going is to take an active interest in politics and governance as it affects every aspect of our lives. The Finance Bill 2024 has been a wake-up call for Gen Zs and other generations to become active participants in decision-making. Content creators, musicians, brands, the church, and politicians who were previously silent on the issue of the Finance Bill changed their tune and joined thousands of Kenyans countrywide, forcing the withdrawal of the Bill. This is only a start, the way to go. For most young people in Kenya, their uniqueness could change many things in this country. This is to say, Gen Z will adapt to the systems, but if they are broken, they will not shy away from fixing them. In their quest for a better future for Kenya, they will continue with the reproduction of democracy, because sitting pretty is no longer their portion. Delulu is no longer the solulu.
As former French Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alex de Tocqueville once said, “Among democratic nations, each new generation is a new people.” Indeed, Gen Z is different from previous generations. How they operate and handle things is different, and this could be a double-edged sword, their greatest asset and their undoing. With this in mind, the way we approach civic education has to change. It has to be more than what the curriculum offers in formal education. It has to be in our character. Gen Zs have for the first time developed a civic disposition as witnessed by their massive turnout in protests across the country. And like any skill, a civic disposition does not mature overnight. Gen Zs must develop this competency over time, listen carefully, be civil, respect the rule of law, learn to negotiate, to compromise, and be responsible for their actions if they want to achieve democratic success.
Gen Zs must continue to develop tools and strategies to help others understand their rights and responsibilities as citizens of this nation. They must continue to use their social media platforms to make complex clauses in the constitution and in any bills passing through parliament accessible to everyone. Within their organisations and groups, they must continue to champion a better future for themselves and for this nation and silence the noises of those who are trying to create unnecessary diversions and division among the generations. Gen Zs must not lose focus; as we have all seen, the enemy is an oppressive regime and this should be the main focus of future revolutions. And rather than maiming, killing, and abducting the harmless children of this nation, the police must protect them; they must respect the constitution and human rights.
Above all, Gen Zs must develop a culture of continuous learning, for the knowledge they acquire gives them the power to question those in power. Where the previous generation started a fight, we continue. Where they went wrong, we correct. Where they failed, we try to fix. In the end, the message is clear – Gen Zs are unstoppable. Gotha Tena!
