Dear Kenyans, We Cannot Out Hustle Bad Governance. Time to Act Is NOW

The story of Kenya’s economy is not written in glossy brochures handed out in foreign capitals. It is written in the daily struggles of wananchi who queue for unga with the same desperation that used to be reserved for election rallies.

Fifty-four million people call this nation home. Out of these, twenty million have registered to vote. But strangely, only three million of them hold formal payslips. Let that sink in: one in eighteen Kenyans has the dignity of a steady salary. The rest are left to improvise survival in a country where improvisation is celebrated as entrepreneurship.

We love to talk about the “middle class.” Politicians parade them like a circus act, the group that will buy cars, houses, and insurance. Yet KNBS tells us only 387,000 Kenyans earn above KSh 100,000 a month. That’s not the middle class. That’s a WhatsApp group.

Banks quietly whisper another uncomfortable truth. Less than one percent of Kenyans have savings above KSh 500,000. Think about that. In a country of 54 million, fewer people have savings than those who attend a single football derby at Kasarani.

Once upon a time, Nairobi was said to be creating dollar millionaires faster than Lagos. Today, the number has shrunk from 7,200 to 6,800 in just twelve months. The millionaires are not multiplying; they are packing up and relocating to Dubai, where policies don’t behave like a mugging gang.

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This shrinking of wealth at the top is not a victory for equity. It is a funeral for ambition. When those who had money are fleeing, the ones who were aspiring remain stuck in traffic, literally and financially.

Most Kenyans live one pay slip—or one boda accident—away from financial ruin. That is not resilience. That is state-sanctioned roulette.

The inequality is no longer a gap. It is a canyon. The formal employment sector is collapsing like an old roof under the weight of corruption, poor planning, and leaders who believe “policy” is just another word for “speech.”

Here’s the brutal fact: you cannot outwork bad policy. You cannot “side hustle” your way out of systemic failure. If the taxman eats faster than you cook, you will never get full.

Compare this to the Moi era of the 1990s. Back then, we thought nothing could get worse than queuing for sugar. Yet here we are, queuing for fuel, queuing for jobs, queuing for bursaries that arrive only after children have dropped out.

Walk into any supermarket. Notice how shopping baskets are shrinking. Families now buy cooking oil in sachets, bread in halves, and sugar in quarter-kilos. The economy is dieting, not out of choice, but because it cannot afford a full plate.

Fuel prices are the new national anthem. Every time global oil shifts by a dollar, Kenyan households feel it like an earthquake. The price of matatus climbs, and suddenly, children walk to school barefoot again.

Inflation has become the new house guest. It comes uninvited, eats everything, and refuses to leave. And yet, leaders smile on TV, quoting “single-digit inflation” while the average Kenyan cannot afford meat twice a week.

In truth, the government has mastered the art of exporting hope. We import debt, we import fuel, we import wheat. But what do we export? Speeches. Long, empty, and full of promises that cannot buy airtime on local radio.

We are told to trust Vision 2030, the Affordable Housing program, and the hustler economy. But how can you build castles in the sky when wananchi are still struggling to afford mabati for the roof?

Look at the education sector. Parents pay through the nose, and when children graduate, they join the millions waiting for jobs that do not exist. Degrees are now certificates of unemployment.

Our health sector is bleeding. Mission hospitals are collapsing. Public hospitals are starved of funding. Politicians still fly abroad for treatment, leaving Kenyans to pray their ailments wait until after the elections.

Corruption has turned governance into a business model. Contracts are not awarded based on merit but on connections. Roads are built, only to collapse before ribbon-cutting. Dams are paid for, only to exist as footnotes in Auditor-General’s reports.

Meanwhile, taxes are collected with the enthusiasm of hyenas around a carcass. Yet services are delivered with the laziness of a cat on a sunny afternoon. The social contract has been rewritten: citizens pay, leaders play.

We cannot ignore the role of banks. They make billions in profits while SMEs suffocate. Credit is priced like luxury champagne, yet farmers are expected to borrow it to plant maize.

And let’s not forget the youth. Seventy percent of Kenya’s population is under 35. But their future has been mortgaged. They are told to “innovate” in an economy where Wi-Fi is more expensive than rent.

Diaspora remittances now outstrip agricultural exports. Our biggest export is not coffee, not tea, but people. Sons and daughters flee to Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Canada, and the UK, while leaders stand at airports waving them off like proud parents.

The housing crisis is another scam in slow motion. Developers build homes priced at 15 million shillings, targeting a class that exists only in PowerPoint slides. Meanwhile, slums swell with forgotten families.

So what is the lesson in all this? The Kenyan dream is on life support. And unless citizens wake up, the plug will be pulled quietly while we’re distracted by another scandal.

We must admit, the problem is not a lack of talent. Kenyans are brilliant, hardworking, and innovative. But when brilliance meets bad governance, the result is frustration, not prosperity.

The “hustler” narrative is nothing more than a band-aid on a bullet wound. Hard work cannot survive theft. Creativity cannot thrive under over-taxation. Ambition cannot breathe under suffocating corruption.

The economy is not a math problem. It is a moral problem. And until we fix governance, the numbers will never add up.

So what do we do? First, we must stop romanticizing survival. Struggling should not be a badge of honor. It should be a red flag that something is deeply wrong.

We must demand accountability. Not on Twitter alone, not only in bar talk, but in action. Ask your MP where the CDF funds went. Ask your MCA why the ward still floods. Ask your governor why hospitals lack medicine.

And when the time comes in 2027, we must vote like our lives depend on it—because they do.

Register. Vote. Demand accountability. That is not just a civic duty; it is self-defense.

If only one in eighteen Kenyans has a payslip, then the ballot must be our payslip.

If only 387,000 Kenyans earn above KSh 100,000, then policies must work for the millions below that threshold.

If less than one percent of Kenyans have savings above KSh 500,000, then governance must be re-engineered to give the majority a fighting chance, not just the elites.

We must treat elections not as entertainment, but as an audit. Every five years, we hire and fire managers. If they fail, they should not be rewarded with a second term.

Because here is the truth: leadership is not about who shouts the loudest on campaign trails. It is about who ensures your child eats, learns, and dreams.

Kenyans are tired of being statistics in reports by the KNBS, IMF, and World Bank. We want to be citizens, not case studies.

We must redefine patriotism. It is not singing the anthem before football games. It is holding leaders accountable so that the nation works for everyone.

We cannot build a country where the only hope for young people is migration. We must create opportunities here so that leaving becomes a choice, not a necessity.

We must demand a government that measures success not in ribbon-cuttings, but in reduced hunger levels, lower school dropouts, and affordable healthcare.

Because at the end of the day, Kenya’s economic reality is not just about numbers. It is about lives. Families. Dreams.

The question is: will we continue to clap for politicians as they loot, or will we rise to demand better?

The numbers don’t lie. But politicians do.

And unless we break this cycle, the next KNBS report will read just like this one.

Only the suffering will have multiplied.

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