Two years after young Kenyans stormed the parliament grounds in Nairobi, the same anger is still there. The same economic pain. The same distrust.
June 25, 2024, was the day it all broke open. Gen Z protesters, fed up with a finance bill they said punished ordinary people while shielding the wealthy, pushed past barriers and entered the seat of government.
It shocked a political system used to controlling things from the top down. That breach was a physical challenge to power, and it was rare. What drove them?
A finance bill that felt like a final insult. Youth unemployment was already stubbornly high.
The cost of basic goods kept climbing. And the gap between political leaders and the citizens they were supposed to serve had become a chasm. Tens of thousands of young Kenyans mobilized first online, then on the streets.
Now, two years later, anti-riot police were back in force in the capital Thursday. Young Kenyans marked the date again. For them, June 25 is no longer just a protest anniversary.
It is a symbol of resistance. Against police brutality.
Against economic hardship. Against a leadership that activists say has lost touch. Faith Njeri, a university student in Nairobi, put it bluntly.
“June 25th is a reminder of what this regime is all about,” she said. “It is a reminder of when you guys lost legitimacy to the people of Kenya … because of just simply saying no to” the finance bill.
The decentralized movement that erupted that day did not vanish. It continues to shape politics. It demands justice.
It challenges power. But the bottom line, activists say, is that little has fundamentally changed. The triggers that sparked the uprising have not been addressed.
The economic triggers. The governance triggers.
The sense that the system protects elites at the expense of everyone else. Investors watching Kenya will note the persistent instability. It is not a one-off event.
It is a condition. The protests two years ago were not a storm that passed.
They were a symptom of something deeper, and that something is still there. By the numbers, the unemployment rate for young Kenyans remains stubbornly high. That is not a new problem, but it is an unresolved one.
The cost of living continues to climb. And the political system, which was shaken by the breach of its own parliament, has not closed the gap between itself and the citizens. If anything, the gap has grown.
For the young Kenyans who poured into the streets in 2024, June 25 is a date that holds a specific weight. It was the day they physically confronted the state.
It was the day they said no. And it is the day they keep coming back to, because the reasons for saying no have not gone away.
