Kenya After Moi

Joel D. Barkan

From Foreign Affairs, January/February 2004

Summary:  Kenya's fragile government is threatened by factionalism, economic challenges, and rising crime. To ensure Nairobi's involvement in the war on terrorism, Washington must be sensitive to its domestic needs, recognizing that fledgling democracies can be more difficult to engage than their authoritarian predecessors.

Joel D. Barkan is Professor of Political Science at the University of Iowa. From 1992 to 1993, he was the U.S. Agency for International Development's governance adviser to Kenya.

The second challenge Kenya faces is improving its economic prospects. NARC campaigned on the promise of restoring economic growth and creating 500,000 new jobs a year, but Kenya's economy has remained flat since NARC took office and there has been little new investment, domestic or foreign. Several factors explain the lack of economic recovery. Kenya's macroeconomic policy has been the source of perennial friction between the government and the international donor community since the mid-1980s. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank regard Kenya's budget deficit -- projected at nearly $800 million in the 2004 fiscal year -- as unsustainable and have urged the government to reduce it by 25 percent. International donors' prescriptions include cutting the government wage bill, privatizing state-owned enterprises, deregulation, and reducing corruption.

The NARC government has taken the last most seriously, elevating the reduction of corruption to the centerpiece of its economic program by committing itself to a "zero tolerance" policy and passing the Anti-Corruption and Economic Crimes Act and the Public Ethics Act. Most noteworthy has been the government's decision to clean up the judiciary. The chief justice was forced to retire in March on allegations of corruption, and 23 senior judges of the Court of Appeal and the High Court and 82 magistrates were suspended in October 2003 -- a dramatic shakeup that removed half the judicial branch overnight. Yet only a few dozen civil servants have been prosecuted for corruption since the new government took office and no present or former elected officials have been prosecuted, despite widespread allegations against them. Even though the multimillion-dollar looting of the Moi era appears to be over, smaller scams and rent-seeking continue.

Moreover, although the IMF and the World Bank are expected to announce the resumption of lending to Kenya -- ending a three-year suspension of new aid -- they are concerned that the deficit will grow even bigger if the government carries out Kibaki's plan to double police salaries and double the number of police to 68,000. These cost increases, coupled with the hiring of more teachers to implement Kibaki's pledge for free primary education, will make it impossible for the government to reduce its wage bill without politically painful retrenchments elsewhere. The government hopes to cover additional costs and lower the deficit by reducing corruption, but this projection is unrealistic. The government's Economic Recovery Strategy, unveiled in June 2003, the goal of which is to reinvigorate the rural economy by supporting the informal and small-scale manufacturing sector, also seems modest when compared with the enormity of this challenge.

Making the government work also requires a new constitution -- the third major challenge faced by Kibaki's government. The constitutional reform issue has been on the table for more than a decade, but Moi's resistance to change meant that the Constitution of Kenya Review Commission, the body charged with drafting a new basic law, was not established until April 2001. It issued its first draft just three months before the 2002 elections, by which time both KANU and the opposition had decided to contest the polls under the existing rules. The commission's proposal called for the devolution of authority to district governments, a substantial reduction of presidential authority, and, most controversially, the establishment of a new prime minister post. Although a National Constitutional Conference has been deliberating these issues since March 2003, they are still yet to be settled.

As already noted, the constitutional reform question has exacerbated tensions within NARC. Odinga and his faction support the original draft, but the old guard and the faction around Murungi are adamantly opposed to its provision for a non-appointed prime minister. Kibaki was elected under the present constitution, they argue, and is thus entitled to retain his full set of executive powers. This dispute has nearly paralyzed the government and could lead to Odinga's desertion from NARC.

TERRORISM'S DEEP IMPRINT

Kenya's economic prospects are clouded by insecurity and the growing threat of terrorism. Crime rates in Kenya's urban areas have skyrocketed since the early 1990s, as the sinews of urban society have been undermined by bad governance, economic decline, rural-urban migration, nearly 900,000 AIDS orphans, and the influx of small arms from Somalia. Violent crime -- particularly car-jackings and killings by hired hit men -- has created a climate of fear.

To reverse this trend, Kenya needs more police. There is currently only one police officer per 850 people, down from the UN standard of one per 450 that Kenya once met. Most are poorly paid, which has driven many into crime just to survive. Once highly respected, the police are now regarded as one of the most corrupt arms of government. Restoring the police force will take time and better salaries, training, and equipment. At an estimated annual cost of $27 million for salaries alone, it is unlikely that the funds will be available anytime soon.

A viable police force is also essential if Kenya is to contain the threat of terrorism within its borders. The bombing of the U.S. embassy in Nairobi on August 7, 1998, killed more than 240 Kenyans and injured 5,000, in addition to the 12 Americans who lost their lives. Kenya was hit again on November 28, 2002, when al Qaeda agents attacked an Israeli-owned hotel north of the port city of Mombasa and almost hit an El Al plane with shoulder-fired SA-7 missiles.