Mass protests in Nairobi -- image via X
Update June 26: In a victory for people power, Kenyan President Ruto has withdrawn the Finance Bill saying "I concede...the people have spoken."
With hundreds of thousands of Kenyans taking to the streets every day in mass protests across the country against the government's new tax bill, police have reacted with severe repression and violence leaving many injured and dead.
Now Kenya’s President William Ruto has declared a state of emergency after protestors stormed parliament.
The mass resistance is in response to massive tax hikes on ordinary people in the recent Finance Bill. As Pan Africanism Today noted the "Kenya Finance Bill 2024 is a punitive attack on the poor and working class people. The bill's taxation elements and policies are alienated from the harsh realities of the Kenyan people and fail to address structural inequalities. The Finance Bill has been a huge discourse in Kenya following the opposing views, debates and discussions which the government has ignored."
With the police violence and state of emergency the Communist Party of Kenya is calling on the president to resign.
The blood spilled on the streets of Kenya lies squarely in the hands of the IMF, the World Bank, and their local puppets led by President Ruto in Nairobi. Yesterday’s peaceful anti-government and anti-Finance Bill protests saw countless people maimed nearly to death and at least 10 comrades martyred. Following this brutality, there was another attack on the most vulnerable in Nairobi's Githurai, where numerous poor residents were murdered in cold blood, their bodies still unaccounted for. Prior to this, countless activists, revolutionaries, and social media influencers were kidnapped by the corrupt Kenya Kwanza regime.
Police set up barricades yesterday on major roads to beat up, execute, and stop protesters from returning home. This is the aftermath; we don’t have a government but organized criminal gangs. The death toll in Githurai is now in excess of 250.
Members of parliament had a chance to avert this crisis by rejecting the IMF-sponsored bill but chose to side with greed, blaming peaceful protestors instead. After the merciless murder of innocent demonstrators, President Ruto appeared on TV issuing threats, valuing property over human life. His cabinet secretary of Defense, the clueless Mr. Duale, joined in, illegally deploying the Kenya Defence Force to the streets to instill fear among the youth. This unconstitutional act is an attempt to suspend the constitution and impose military rule, which will only ignite further resistance.
Today, members of parliament were again whipped into the August House to undo Mr. Duale’s illegality by declaring a state of emergency, allowing President Ruto to rule without accountability. This man, still drunk on the teachings of the dead dictator Moi, is destined to face the same rejection.
Tomorrow, the Kenyan masses will take to the streets in peaceful demonstration, as per the Kenyan constitution. Despite the state's promised violence, the unarmed Kenyan people will raise their hands in defiance of the neo-colonial project, demanding that Ruto reject the finance bill. They will honor the martyrs and declare their willingness to fight for a dignified Kenya, raising the flag of martyrdom for those who died under the British Empire's savagery, in Moi's dungeons, and in the struggle for the 2010 constitution.
Tyranny can only be defeated by resistance, not negotiation. We honor all martyrs and wish a quick recovery to those nursing gunshot wounds in various facilities.
Down with IMF !
Down with US imperialism!
Ruto Must Go!
Signed,
Central Organizing Committee of the Communist Party of Kenya