In Defence of the Middle Class

Nowadays, it has become fashionable to bash the Kenyan middle-class. We are excoriated for our perceived propensity to sit in front of computer screens whinging about electoral results that we were too lazy to try and influence by our vote. In fact, much of this is a form of self-flagellation, as very middle-class (we'll get into definitions in a minute) journalists and political analysts beat themselves up over their unwillingness to endure long queues in the hot sun at polling stations and blame themselves for the fact that the likes of Ferdinand Waititu will be running the country. “If only we had voted,” they wail while ignoring the blatantly obvious truth: it wouldn’t have made an iota of difference.

It would be first of all helpful to define who we are referring to when we say “middle class.” Last year, the African Development Bank released a report that defined the African middle class as anyone who can afford to spend $2 and $20 per day. By that measure, nearly half the Kenyan population is “middle class.” According to one account, measured by wage distribution the middle class would mathematically constitute anyone earning between Kshs 8,000 and Kshs 25,000 per month.

However, it is clear that these are not the people our political pundits are moaning about. The middle class they have in mind is totally different from the middle class that actually exists. They are probably thinking of people who have achieved earning and lifestyle levels similar to the stereotypical fictions of US sitcoms, those whom The Economist calls part of the global middle class “with an income between the average Brazilian and Italian, and whose members have as much in common with each other as with the poor in their own countries.” They probably have a tertiary education, a well-paying job that allows them a reasonable amount of discretionary income. They can afford a car or two and take their kids to private schools. They are professional urbanites, have good access to the internet and flaunt the latest hi-tech gadgets, are no strangers to international travel and can take out a mortgage.

Here’s the rub. However you cut it, this is an exceedingly small number of voters. The Economist estimates that in the developing world as a whole, they are less than 10 percent of the population. Duncan Clarke of the management advisory group Global Pacific told the BBC last year that "the actual real middle class in Africa that sits in a global middle-class income level is less than 5% - that would be about 50 million people spread in different countries across the continent, concentrated largely in some high-income countries such as South Africa and Nigeria."

So at best we are talking of 1 in 20 Kenyans. So when Caroline Mutoko bemoans the fact that many of these do not bother to vote and suggests that this is the reason politicians do not hold rallies in Kileleshwa or Karen, she fails to grasp that politicians can do math. 19 votes in Kibera or a single one in Langata? It’s a no brainer!

It is also disingenuous to claim that this class of Kenyans is indifferent to politics and hides behind social media. Democracy is about more than a queue outside a polling booth. The fulminations one reads on Facebook and Twitter do not suggest apathy. The arguments are engaged, opinionated and, sometimes, knowledgeable. Their influence is evidenced by the fact that politicians have also taken to social media. It is this middle class that conceptualized and delivered the much-lauded presidential debate. It is this class that mobilized the mass-action movement of the 90s; that through their activism and argument on the streets and in the media and, yes, on Facebook and Twitter, sets the agenda for the nation and highlights issues. They are an army of writers and journalists, activists and cartoonists, bloggers and musicians. Boniface Mwangi, Mwalimu Mati, Gado, Mutuma Mathiu, Eric Wainana, Julie Gichuru and many others, even perhaps, Caroline Mutoko herself are part of this and their contribution to our national political life is not any less valid or valuable if they choose not to cast a ballot.

By all means go out and vote. However, do so with the understanding that, given their relatively scant numbers, the greater value of our corner of the global middle class lies in their ability to articulate issues, influence the national agenda and mobilize the masses of the poor, those 90% of Kenyans whose vote is actually the one that counts. It is only by empowering that most numerous class of Kenyans to understand and appreciate the difference between a Waititu and a Jimnah Mbaru that the middle class will affect the outcome of elections. Not by standing in line.

Bull Fight in Brazil

The Matador, Fernando Alonso

The Gleaming Reaper

Every nation has its myths. The Americans have their exceptionalism -the supposed "city on a hill", the Koreans their Tan'gun, supposedly the scion of a son of the gods and a bear-turned-into-woman who became the first human king of the people of the peninsula. Kenyans are not to be left out. At death, their politicians are raptured through pearly white gates, instantly forgiven for earthly sins and elevated to the status of national heroes, joining the mythical pantheon that bequeathed uhuru, dignity and relative, if somewhat skewed, prosperity to the population.

The public outpouring of grief over the passing in the past week of John Michuki and Njenga Karume has once again highlighted this cognitive dissonance at the heart of the national narrative. For here, Kenyans are celebrating the lives of people who were part and parcel of the very establishment that consigned them to seemingly perpetual poverty and indignity; persons who openly sought to subvert the constitution in the service of tribal supremacy; who had no qualms about using inordinate violence to instil order and crush dissent in the same way they had previously sought to crush the Mau Mau rebellion; whose accomplishments -such as they were- rarely outlived their time in office; who lived and died in luxury while their countrymen languished in penury.

Kenyans at times appearto suffer from the Stockholm Syndrome where hostages develop positive feelings for their captors. According to Wikipedia, this is a form of traumatic bonding, which causes victims to develop strong emotional ties with those who intermittently harass, beat, threaten, abuse, and intimidate them.

Take the late Michuki, for example. The past few days have seen the newspapers and social media filled with glowing eulogies and tributes to his energy and discipline. In an article in the Daily Nation, Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi, he of the fight for democracy (see my take on him here) approvingly quotes a young woman who describes Michuki "a good dictator." Dr. Kituyi declares that "in a society so beholden to short-term popularity, Michuki did what he thought was right regardless of how popular it was."

He continues:

"Over the past two decades, the struggle against authoritarian government necessarily gave strong focus to libertarian agitation. The battle call for change has been about rights. The results have been satisfactory. A Constitution that defines and defends all the rights acceptable in a democratic society is in place. But we have in the process behaved as if life is all about haki yetu."

It is interesting that the good Dr. Kituyi does not seem to recall that Michuki once sought to convince Kenyans, following the demise of the KANU dictatorship in 2002, that the reform they had fought so hard and so long for was no longer necessary.

Further, the methods that the "good dictator"employed, such as his preference for extrajudicial murder as a technique for dealing with criminal suspects, are glossed over as mere "mistakes." As one Facebook comment I have seen says:

"Yes, some youth died but let's be practical. They were terrorizing villages and attacked his home, and women bore the front of it by being forced to be circumcised and to join the group! The be-headings ( case in point- a former member's head found dumped in a sack off River rd) that followed if one member 'betrayed' the sect."

Of course the fact that all this is unproven in a court of law, that some innocent people may have been executed along with the Mungiki, is not something to lose sleep over.

There is little discussion of how Michuki acquired his wealth or his nickname "Kimeendero" (meaning the one who crushes) or the fact that he had no scruples about handing out cash as enticements to potential voters during campaigns for public office. None of his being named in Parliament as allegedly demanding US$3 million as protection fee for the Artur brothers or of the "rattlesnake" raid on the Standard offices. None of the various scandals where his name popped up including his decision as Transport Minister in 2003 to exempt a company represented by his son from telecommunications regulations; the allegation by the Public Investment Committee that he, together with Prof Anyang’ Nyong’o, Dr Mukhisa Kituyi had "interfered with tendering processes at the Kenya Ports Authority contrary to government procedure"; or the suspicious speed with which containers of seat belts and speed governors arrived at the Mombasa port shortly after he gazetted his famous "Michuki Rules."

For Kenyans, death is the ultimate sanitizer. In the cemetery that is the collective memory, the tended graves and monuments are reserved for the powerful, the corrupt and the wicked. Their records -purged of indiscretion- are presented as examples to emulate. Meanwhile, the ordinary Kenyans who bore the brunt of their violence, both physical and economic, rest unlamented in unmarked graves.