Alternative manifesto: Why Kenya needs a new vision, not government

The 2027 countdown continues and we are now 40 weeks to voting day. From the political mischief common to our pre-election fashion, the “whom” (the persons) on the Presidential ballot will somehow emerge. Behind the scenes, the “whom” is quietly emerging for the five other electoral posts we vote on – Governors, MPs (Senators, National Assembly and Women Reps) and County Assembly Members.

Naturally, it’s the high-stakes Presidential contest that commands the most visible attention right now, especially across our mainstream media.  Yet, in practice, it is easy to suspect we might have a clear rural-urban divide in voter behaviour between “bottom-up” (from MCA/MP upwards) and “top-down” (from President/Governor downwards) respectively – a 70:30 mix in our electoral demography.  Let’s leave that thought for the scholarly research that tells us voters are not rational, when in fact they have a rationale.

Beyond the “whom”, most of the noise we are hearing in the public square is centred on the “what” (the agenda).  Running on what they believe is a solid performance record, we have President Ruto and his Kenya Kwanza brigade calling on the opposition to present an alternative agenda.  Then, beyond “wantam” clapbacks, we have a hazy mix of opposition responses around scrapping some things (like SHA or affordable housing), stopping others (like waste and corruption in government, over-taxation or debt service using the odious debt argument) or, more vaguely, promising to restore constitutionalism and the rule of law.  Don’t be fooled by the noise.  Again, behind the scenes, everybody has begun assembling their 2027 manifestos.  But how many are putting together a vision, “the why,” that merges “whom” and what”?

How many, including the incumbents, can offer us an honest, unvarnished picture of today as our baseline; an inspiring, imaginative picture of tomorrow as our vision; and a “how-to” strategic pathway from baseline to vision?  How many view Katiba as a policy guide to promote good beyond a legal command to prevent bad?  Wouldn’t the ultimate “people’s manifesto” be the “how-to” constitutional implementation path starting from where we are, not “if only” where we think we ought to be?  Baseline-Vision-Strategy right there; Plans-Budgets-Implementation (including Procurement) follow later.  We can dream, can’t we?

This dream only materialises with an entire leadership cadre focused on the next generation, not the election.

So let’s go back to Planet Kenya and work with what we have.  On this planet of ours, the Kenya Kwanza (KK) development agenda, BETA, is built around five pillars – agriculture/food security; MSMEs; universal health care (UHC); affordable housing and the digital superhighway/creative economy.  There are other ways to assess KK’s performance, from their response to the perfect storm of global uncertainty, fiscal/debt stress and structural economic imbalance to the current “shiny things” bombardment we are experiencing, but let’s stick with the pillars and link them to the emerging alternative manifesto debate.

Beginning with successes and challenges, KK will celebrate gains in agricultural production and market outcomes, even though one in six Kenyans remains food-poor and climate change is real.  The Hustler Fund has been a cash flow, rather than wealth creation, innovation, and MSMEs continue to struggle with the cost of doing business, including taxation, while SMEs are still stuck in the “missing middle” of financing.  Healthcare success will be claimed in SHA’s mass enrolment (if not payment) and the deployment of Community Health Promoters and primary health care, though operational and logistical issues continue to bedevil overall rollout.  In similar fashion, the mass construction under affordable housing will be offered as a plus, including job creation (especially MSME opportunities) despite ongoing devolution friction over land and disconnects between income earners and buyers, and house building versus utilities provision. Expansions in the national fibre backbone, public wi-fi, digitised public services and monetised creatives will be claimed as successes, but last-mile connectivity and the digital literacy divide are emerging issues.

Where might KK’s next manifesto look?  On agriculture, the Agri-Connect blueprint that introduces blended financing (basically public funding de-risking private financing) and shifts us to agro-processing.  The lesson on MSMEs is to go better on group-based lending and ward-based cooperatives, as first envisaged.  In other words, elevating the thinking from dominant consumption to prevalent production.  The focus for UHC going forward might be operational stabilisation, especially after the rushed transition, while social housing could be the new flavour of the month on affordable housing.  Finally, don’t be surprised if the digital gig economy is mainstreamed as part of an Africa-leading tech outsourcing strategy.

Let’s continue brainstorming.  With the benefit of hindsight, what could KK have done differently?  On agriculture, might irrigation have been prioritised over subsidies, and could the cold-chain storage strategy have come earlier?  On MSMEs, should the Hustler Fund have been linked earlier to business training, and might more space have been given to less aggressively onboard them onto taxes?  On UHC, could the NHIF-to-SHA transition have been better phased, with historical debts cleared first?  Should better public consensus have been sought on the affordable housing tax, then levy it as a flat tax (similar question for UHC contributions), and might there have been more collaboration with counties on the prioritisation of basic utilities for affordable houses?  Finally, on digital, should there have been a better balance between, figuratively, the road (fibre) and the car owner (digital user through low-cost devices? Food for thought.

We are sticking with the five pillars, but we already have plenty for an alternative agenda even before we get to the pillar outcomes – freedom from hunger, access to health and shelter, and real jobs and incomes.

What if it isn’t just about fixing KK’s gaps, but doing things differently?  Well, on agriculture, how about supporting farmer cooperatives to aggregate bulk inputs and guarantee off-take prices to farmers rather than individual input subsidies?  On MSMEs, why not turn the Hustler Fund into a credit guarantee scheme?  On housing, is there still room to move away from the levy and offer private sector building incentives?  And shouldn’t we fully decentralise health care funding to counties, away from centralised control? Could a clever digital alternative be to remove the regulation and bureaucracy around last-mile connectivity?

In other words, an alternative that combines course correction with a dose of rebuilding. So it’s less about “let’s scrap everything” or “let’s revert to previous” and more “what’s working, what’s not, what’s next”.

Which brings us to the end.  On paper, BETA and the previous administration’s “Big Four Agenda” spoke to the same broad areas, except that the latter is supposed to be a bottom-up design while the latter was almost exclusively top-down (think MSMEs versus (existing) Manufacturing). In practice, though, BETA is largely a top-down, or centralised, affair in terms of management and control.  Yet, lest we forget, agriculture, healthcare and housing are devolved functions, while MSMEs and digital/creative exist “kwa ground”.  There is also the view that BETA is the application of a market-led model to social challenges.

So maybe the true alternative manifesto isn’t market-first and centralised, but constitution-first and decentralised.  When BETA (and “Big Four”) spoke to Article 43 rights, did they forget the devolution anchor?  If SHA was one solution to UHC, is there a better one, such as a National Health Trust Fund that uses an earmarked and pooled revenue-sharing model distributed across counties?  On agriculture, do we need to create county agri-hubs based on conditional agricultural development grants?  Ditto, housing and a rights-based Urban Upgrade Fund (because it’s urban, not rural, housing in question). Or the MSME/digital merger into a single Transit and Digital Hub backed by a proper credit guarantee scheme.

Here's the real trick.  Rights and dignity replace markets and taxation.  True devolution replaces today’s centralised control.  Punitive levies give way to blended financing.  And the financial inclusion goal becomes a goal around structural equity.  Scrapping and stopping things as unconstitutional is one way to go.  But might the alternative – ironically, the true “Usawa ni Sawa” - manifesto actually be hiding in plain sight?