Thank Kenyans for cancellation of Adani deals, not foreign pressure

President William Ruto delivers his State of the Nation Address at the Parliament plenary,Nairobi. November 21st, 2024 [Elvis Ogina, Standard]

It began by admitting that “rare are the times when leadership is ahead of the people; we are always striving to steer the machinery of state and government to keep pace with the aspirations of citizens." It confessed that “we have learnt... that listening is a full-time occupation of leadership, and that all questions asked by the people must be answered thoroughly and in full."

In conclusion, it affirmed that “we value the contributions of all, whether they come in the form of support or encouragement, suggestion or proposal, criticism or protest” while noting that “the most powerful component of leadership is listening and learning." Think “light bulb” moment!

For the avoidance of doubt, these are excerpts from the preamble and conclusion of President William Ruto’s State of the Nation (SOTN) address to Parliament and the people on November 21. This positive tone in response to the public mood was an unusual highlight of the address.

If there are important reflections (lessons, observations, messages) from the address which speak to the future of this regime, this first one is listening and learning. As leadership and management gurus will tell you, change or transformation is really about three simple steps: “Listen-Think and Consult-Act”. Everything else at a process level – methodology, tools, technology, etc.—is detail.

Let’s look for more reflections from the main body of the address which basically fell under three themes – the economy (and BETA), democracy (rights and security) and governance (corruption).

Of course, nobody—not even the media—read the address like this, because the “red meat” headline was the President’s directive to immediately cancel the Adani Group’s privately initiated PPP proposals (PIPs) around JKIA and KETRACO. Once we get past the “KANU-esque” response by MPs, from standing ovations in the House to post-event interviews and comments in mainstream and social media, and mixed to positive public response, four reflections emerge.

Local whistleblowers

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First, our eagerness to celebrate foreign pressure as the reason these deals were cancelled understates the important role played by local whistleblowers. We need to reverse this thinking. Isn’t it Kenyans who held their government to account – isn’t whistleblowing a patriotic act?

Second, wasn’t this abrupt cancellation, as with the 2024 Finance Bill, exactly the warning sign to the Kenya Kwanza administration that, as stated earlier, they need to listen more and talk less?

Third, and on the flip side, what do abrupt policy/transaction reversals like this mean for domestic and foreign investor confidence in Kenya, before we even get to international borrowing markets?

Fourth, how did the deals get so far – hence due diligence, transparency and accountability questions about our PPPs, and Parliament’s role in oversighting these “off-budget” transactions?

Beyond Adani, what might we reflect on under the economy, democracy and governance themes?

Let’s remember here that the whole point of the SOTN address was to speak directly to the progress we are making as a nation on Articles 2 (international obligations), 10 (national values and principles of governance) and 240 (security) of the constitution.

Sadly, our post-katiba Presidents prefer to file “difficult to access” reports on these subjects; then speak to their own topics. One day we will get it right with national addresses – including Madaraka, Mashujaa and Jamhuri Day – and speak to Kenya as an idea, and not the work of the Kenyan government.

As expected, Ruto’s address focused on the economy and Bottom-Up Economic Transformation Agenda (BETA). The short story is we came from a bad place but our macro (shilling, exchange, inflation, interest, forex reserves, growth) is looking good. But the people are not feeling good.

So BETA is used to explain ongoing progress in micro – more maize, sugar and milk production, UHC as Taifacare, affordable urban housing to safeguard our rural land for food, digital economy, MSMEs and the Hustler Fund, plus CBC and university funding model on education and labour migration as brand new pillars. Fact-checking media was quick to highlight contradictions in the data (this requires an article of its own) but it’s the logic that’s missing. Hence three reflections.

First, is the economy stable, or is it stagnant? Stagnant is the everyday person’s experience of money not circulating “as it used to”. Add the armchair view that the debt part of government spending is bleeding everything else dry, hence official desperation for taxes and other revenues, the growing pile of pending bills plus delayed salary and services payments, the deliberate management of the shilling to ease foreign debt service, the efforts to contain food and fuel prices to ease inflation, and hence interest rates to cut domestic debt service. It’s not a hopeful view.

Which then leads to questions on Kenya Kwanza’s ability (competence) and/or incentive (to cut waste/corruption/vested interests) to fix this. Simply, is that they cannot? Or they will not?

Second, on the flip side, has the “stabilized” economy really weathered what we are always told was a perfect economic storm? – how far are we in building resilience to global economic pressures and uncertainties? Will fiscal consolidation end any time soon? In restructuring our economy, are the claimed micro-economic gains – at, say, food production level – sustainable?

Third, and remember these are reflections, the big question – is Kenya Kwanza’s the only way to fix the economy? This may sound naïve but one suspects that this administration might have achieved greater buy-in and ownership of the transformation agenda with better articulation, but mostly with action consistent with the words. BETA is not a zero-sum game, it reads like a pro-poor effort where greater attention is focused on the poor than the non-poor. What it looks like today is a war on the old middle class to create a new middle class without touching the elite.

On democracy, the address was quick to focus on national security versus the rights and freedoms of the people, with lots of lip service towards extra-judicial killings and abductions. The reflection might be we seek the economic kingdom without, not before or after, the political one. As a long-term thought, we will not fix this until we have our own, fit-for-purpose political-economic-social model in the same way that, for good or bad, the West and East have theirs.

Supply and demand

Which brings us to governance, where the focus was waste and corruption. As with the theme on democracy, this was clearly a reluctant part of the SOTN address, which is probably why the Adani announcement was clearly designed to add some “buzz” to the subject. Two reflections.

First, the need to strengthen the supply and demand sides of the governance equation. On the demand side of the citizenry - transparency, accountability and participation. On the supply side of government – delivery capabilities, responsiveness and accountability. Neither works properly.

Relatedly, and finally, think bigger. While it is fine to criticize the DPP, Judiciary, Parliament and the Treasury on their inputs to the war on graft, what’s really missing from this administration is a holistic triple agenda around public sector (and public enterprise) reform, private sector development (and business environment) reform and public finance management reform.

So there it is; a dozen reflections on the SOTN address. Beginning by “listening and learning”.