Kenyans must interrogate, not just react to government policy decisions

In January, I argued in these pages that the nation’s policy maturity hinges on its capacity to confront its past mistakes and learn from them. I challenged policymakers to view public discontent, economic missteps, and institutional failures not as nuisances, but as opportunities for reform. That challenge remains. But in the heat of the Finance Bill 2025 and by extension the Constitutional Amendment Bill 2025 debates, it is time we turn the scrutiny inward to ourselves.

A democracy is only as good as the vigilance of its citizens. Article 1 of the Kenyan Constitution declares without ambiguity: “All sovereign power belongs to the people of Kenya.” And yet, as a society, we have grown far too comfortable outsourcing this sovereignty to politicians, technocrats, and commentators, reducing civic participation to annual protests and performative outrage on social media. This abdication comes at a cost. Bad policy does not survive because of malice alone but also thrives in the shadows of public apathy.

The current Finance Bill saga makes this point uncomfortably clear. From proposed interventions on tax administration and review of exemptions on essential goods, policy decisions are once again being served to the public as immovable facts. The pattern is depressingly familiar: Government announces, citizens react, Parliament rubber-stamps. Months later, we are left to pick up the pieces, lamenting high costs, stagnant incomes, and deteriorating services. The deeper problem isn’t just the bad decisions, it’s that most citizens only encounter policy as fait accompli.

This is dangerous. In a digital age saturated with misinformation and political spin, the most subversive threat to democracy isn’t censorship. It’s indifference. A 2024 Oxford Internet Institute study found that over 70 per cent of citizens in emerging democracies encounter politically motivated fake news weekly. In Kenya, where political narratives are traded like currency on WhatsApp groups and Twitter trends, this environment turns policy debate into a contest of sensationalism rather than substance.

It is no longer enough for citizens to react to government decisions. The duty now is to interrogate them. To demand clarity not just on what policies are being proposed, but why, who benefits, who bears the cost, and what trade-offs are being made. This is the essence of interrogative citizenship — an active, informed public that insists on more than slogans and soundbites.

Public policy, and fiscal policy, in particular, is deliberately complex. The Finance Bill 2025 runs to over 150 pages of dense legal jargon, technical amendments, and cross-referenced clauses. It’s not designed for public comprehension. But that is precisely why it must be interrogated. When citizens disengage, governments have little incentive to explain, justify, or amend. As the Greek statesman Pericles cautioned millennia ago: “Just because you do not take an interest in politics does not mean politics won’t take an interest in you.”

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And politics is taking an interest. The proposed restructuring of the digital service tax, for instance, is sold as a measure to level the playing field in the digital economy. On the surface, it sounds fair. But beneath the PR lies a real question: How does one tax innovation without stifling it? What are the unintended consequences for small-scale digital entrepreneurs barely surviving in a sluggish economy? Will this policy secure long-term revenue, or kill future opportunities? These are not questions for economists alone. They are questions that touch every household’s earning power, cost of living, and prospects for upward mobility.

The constitutional promise of public participation, enshrined in Article 10 as a national value, has been reduced to poorly publicised town halls and perfunctory online notices. It has become a procedural box to tick rather than a genuine conversation with the people whose lives these policies will reorder. This is no accident. A disengaged, poorly informed public makes governance easier for those in power. But it hollows out democracy from within.

This needs to end. The burden now falls on citizens to reclaim their rightful place in the policymaking ecosystem. Not just as voters or occasional protesters, but as active interrogators of government action. It means reading beyond headlines. Questioning the fiscal assumptions behind tax hikes. Demanding evidence for budget cuts. Tracing the beneficiaries of opaque policy decisions. It means refusing to be manipulated by outrage merchants and misinformation peddlers.

Liberty in the digital age no longer dies through censorship, it dies in distraction. The most insidious form of disenfranchisement today is not being denied a vote but being drowned in irrelevant noise while consequential decisions are made elsewhere.

The government, for its part, must reimagine what public participation looks like in a digital democracy. It’s not enough to hold ceremonial hearings or publish technical notices on obscure websites. Citizens must be invited into the policymaking process early, with policy drafts explained in plain language, trade-offs laid bare, and feedback mechanisms that have teeth. “Policy without participation is authoritarianism by another name,” as the policy scholar John Gaventa rightly observed.

But no constitutional provision, no legal requirement, and no civic body will substitute for an interrogative citizenry. The responsibility rests with us. Democracy is not self-sustaining. It is maintained by the perpetual curiosity, scepticism, and vigilance of the people it serves. The Finance Bill 2025 is not just a test of government intent — it’s a test of citizen will.

If we fail to interrogate policy today, we forfeit the right to complain about its consequences tomorrow. The Kenya we inherit tomorrow will be shaped by the taxes we accept today, the economic priorities we allow, and the policies we ignore. It’s time to decide: Will we remain spectators of our democracy, or its custodians?