Tear gas, stones and flames as Kenya protesters say 'Ruto must go!'
Riot police fired tear gas grenades and charged at stone-throwing protesters in downtown Nairobi and across Kenya on Tuesday, marking the most widespread unrest since at least two dozen protesters died in clashes a week ago.
The nationwide demonstrations signaled President William Ruto's failure to appease a spontaneous youth protest movement, despite abandoning plans for tax hikes that triggered the unrest last week.
Tuesday's demonstrations began in an ebullient mood but turned violent as the day wore on. In Nairobi's downtown business district, police in helmets and carrying shields and wooden clubs charged at protesters, while tear gas bombs exploded in the crowds. A kiosk was set ablaze, medics tended to a youth with a bloody hand, and police bundled other youths into the bed of a pickup truck.
Outside the capital, hundreds of protesters marched through Mombasa, Kenya's second-largest city on the Indian Ocean coast. They carried palm fronds, blew on plastic horns, beat on drums, and chanted, "Ruto must go!" Later, Kenya's NTV television reported two people shot in Mombasa, showing pictures of cars ablaze.
Facing the worst crisis of his nearly two-year-old presidency, Ruto is caught between demands from lenders such as the International Monetary Fund to cut deficits and a hard-pressed population reeling from the soaring cost of living. The protest movement, which has no official leaders and largely organizes via social media, rejected Ruto's appeals for dialogue even after he abandoned his proposed tax hikes.
"People are dying in the streets and the only thing he can talk about is money. We are not money. We are people. We are human beings," protester Milan Waudo told Reuters in Mombasa. "He needs to care about his people because if he can't care about his people then we don't need him in that chair."
Protests also erupted in Kisumu, Nakuru, Kajiado, Migori, Mlolongo, and Rongo, according to images broadcast on Kenyan television. In the southwestern town of Migori, protesters set tires on fire.
Activists blamed Tuesday's violence on infiltrators they said had been unleashed by the government to discredit their movement, urging protesters to disperse. "Good people. Let’s go home. As usual, the government has let goons take over, loot, and burn property again," prominent activist Boniface Mwangi wrote on X.
The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNHCR) reports 39 Kenyans killed in demonstrations and clashes with police since June 18, with most deaths occurring on June 25 when officers opened fire near parliament as some protesters tried to storm the building to prevent lawmakers from voting on the tax hikes. "We are determined to push for the president's resignation," said activist Ojango Omondi in Nairobi. "We hope for a peaceful protest and minimal casualties, if any."
Authorities appealed for calm. "It's a beautiful day to choose patriotism. A beautiful day to choose peace, order, and the sanctity of our nationhood," State House communications director Gerald Bitok wrote on X, adding in Swahili: "Violence is not patriotism."
Opposition leader Raila Odinga, runner-up in the last four presidential elections, backed the protesters despite their call for politicians to stay out of the movement. "The youth have given our country its last best chance," Odinga's ODM party said in a statement. "We either seize it and swim with it by implementing all their demands, or we ignore it and sink the country altogether."
The protests, initially an online outpouring of anger over nearly $2.7 billion of tax increases in a proposed finance bill, have grown into a nationwide movement against corruption and misgovernance. Ruto has directed the treasury to find ways to cut spending to fill the budget gap left by the withdrawal of the tax plans and indicated that more borrowing would be required.
Veteran anti-corruption activist John Githongo told Reuters that while Ruto had addressed the nation and media, "there isn't an indication that he wants to take action" on protesters' demands, including firing corrupt officials. "There hasn't been any indication by the government that they are going to take the calls to deal with corruption seriously," he said.
The protests had been mostly peaceful until June 25, when some demonstrators briefly stormed parliament and set part of it ablaze, prompting police to open fire. Ruto has defended the actions of the police and blamed the violence on "criminals" who had hijacked the demonstrations.
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