They defied tight security and billowing tear gas.
In a new campaign, a group of Kenyans is urging President William Ruto to institute radical reforms, including firing corrupt officials from his inner circle.
The demands were not signed for fear of reprisal and there is no official spokesperson for the agitators.
On Wednesday, Ruto promised to engage with the youth and civil society and listen to their plight.
The Finance Bill containing what protesters and many residents called “punitive” taxes was rejected by Ruto and scrapped by the National Assembly on Thursday.
Ruto already caved in to protesters and the new push for dismissal puts the President on the horns of dilemma as he may be forced to sacrifice some of his allies. “The feeling is that the leadership is insensitive to the plight of Kenyans, is detached from public opinion, and views members of the public as a nuisance rather than as co-actors in nation-building,” veteran activist Suba Churchill told the Star.
“The administration looks as though it wants to torpedo the Constitution and govern the way they know how, by standing against the people and rolling back on gains,” he said.
In a new online campaign, agitators say Ruto should fire government bureaucrats, including members of his Cabinet with questions about their integrity.
There have been concerns that powerful individuals close to power have become overnight multi-millionaires, openly displaying opulence, while the masses suffer.
“It’s more than the Finance Bill, it’s the opulence amidst struggle, it’s the arrogance displayed in the face of economic turmoil,” a Rift Valley businessman posted on X on Thursday.
According to new online postings, critics want Ruto to, among other steps, drop the Chief Administrative Secretary position and change Kenya Kwanza leadership in the National Assembly.
They also want the funding scrapped for the First Lady's office, and those of the spouses of Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua and Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi.
Treasury books showed that the offices of the First Lady and the spouse of the deputy president were allocated budgets exceeding Sh1.2 billion in the next financial year.
Questions are also being raised about MPs’ salaries considered by most Kenyans as being far too high and their many perks being another burden on the taxpayer.
Some MPs take home almost Sh2 million a month, depending on their millage claims.
Scrapping the affordable housing levy is also on the list of demands with calls for a thorough audit of the contributions undertaken.
Further, protesters want the state to publish an audit of how the contributions have been used in the last year and they want those contributions refunded.
The activist team also demands the President sack all government officials with criminal records and integrity issues.
In his televised address on Wednesday, DP Gachagua intimated that the current administration had not paid careful attention to the issues sparking the countrywide protests.
The DP also suggested the National Intelligence Service had not been giving the head of state a proper brief and the full picture of the prevailing situation
The Star further established the proposed increase in fuel levy by 39 per cent is also intensifying the agitation.
The proposal was adopted by the Finance Committee of the National Assembly and is now being followed up through a legal notice.
"Forcing a bad bill [down our throats] was evil enough for us, it indicts the conduct of the President and he can only do us as a favour if he goes home, not tomorrow, not next week, just now," Geoffrey Bosire, an agitator from Kisii, posted.
The government calls the agitations part of a wider plot by forces out to topple the Ruto administration.
Defence Cabinet Secretary Aden Duale told the Star the new demands and continued protests were defeating the original purpose that the tax law be withdrawn.
“We wanted to know the true people with a problem with the Finance Bill and those with other agendas, and it is now clear there is more to the protests,” he said.
Duale said the government will pull out all stops to contain those out to cause mayhem to achieve their unspecified agenda.
“We will not allow the country to go the way some of our neighbours have been taken. We will maintain law and order, protect critical infrastructure, and protect the people,” the Defence CS said.
The government on Thursday deployed military personnel to man key streets in Nairobi, and major towns, including Nakuru and Kisumu.
Majority Whip Silvanus Osoro said that there were forces taking advantage of the situation to pursue their personal agendas.
“Whoever it is will be found and shall pay for it,” he said. The protesters have been categorical that there was no external influence behind their campaign.
Changes to the Linda Mama programme are also sparking rage, as well as the newly established Social Health Insurance Fund, which demonstrators want done away with.
Protesters also say government officials are wasteful and should, for instance, travel strictly on state-owned vehicles and other public transportation. They cite state-owned trains, helicopters and aeroplanes – strictly for business.
Pro-government quarters say the crisis could be stemming from the government’s perceived closeness to the West and the IMF.
Youths demonstrating in major towns carried placards that read “IMF is the enemy.”
On the issue of the Bretton Woods institutions, Prof Gitile Naituli said there was no way out of the quagmire unless the government “reverses the gear on IMF and World Bank policies”.
“The bottom line is that if Kenyan parliamentarians do not reverse gear on IMF and World Bank policies, no amount of dialogue will change the status, Kenya remains doomed,” he said.
Kenya has adopted a policy of no external commercial borrowing to bring down the debt.
For some Kenya Kwanza leaders, the demonstrations have continued because the citizens are not sure the tax bill was dead and buried for good.
Embakasi Central MP Benjamin Mwangi, popularly known as Mejjadonk, said that looking at the arguments on social media, the concern could be the withdrawn tax law would resurface at some point.
He dismissed assertions that more issues were fuelling the protests, save for the uncertainty of whether “the President has powers to withdraw a bill.”
“They feel that the President has no power to withdraw a bill and are likely to press harder until Parliament is recalled to withdraw the taxes. Reading any other thing is a misplaced idea,” he said.
Some agitators also said the government was out to dilute their unified resolve to push out rogue public officials.
