Real targets are not Burundians but Kenyans working abroad

President William Ruto’s increasingly hostile rhetoric towards foreigners in small businesses and low-paying jobs in Kenya is being presented as a defence of Kenyan workers. But we should interrogate this policy deeply.

What if the people who ultimately suffer most are not the Burundians, Ugandans, Rwandans or Congolese being targeted today, but Kenyans living, working and investing across the region? That possibility deserves attention.

A Burundian doing mjengo in Nairobi is not responsible for Kenya’s unemployment crisis. A Rwandan shopkeeper did not design our taxation system.

A Congolese waiter did not accumulate Kenya’s public debt. A Ugandan mechanic did not determine interest rates, expenditure or economic policy. These people are convenient targets because they possess little power. That should concern everyone.

When governments become unpopular, scapegoating offers a shortcut. Identify a visible minority, associate it with suffering, and suggest that removing it will restore prosperity. Kenya must ask an uncomfortable question.

What happens to Kenyans elsewhere in Africa when we begin pushing out their citizens?

Thousands of Kenyans have built livelihoods across Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Tanzania, South Sudan and beyond. They are bankers, teachers, consultants, engineers, traders, hotel workers, construction workers, transporters, professionals and entrepreneurs. Regional integration works through reciprocity.

We welcome their citizens and expect their governments to welcome ours. Destroy that understanding and retaliation becomes foreseeable.

If Burundi concludes that its citizens are unwelcome in Kenya, what prevents restrictions against Kenyans in Bujumbura? If Rwanda responds similarly, Kenyan professionals and businesses there could suffer.

If Uganda decides Kenyans should surrender opportunities supposedly belonging to Ugandans, livelihoods could be endangered.

The DRC matters enormously. Kenyan banks, businesses, professionals, traders and workers increasingly look towards Congo as an economic frontier. This is why I am unwilling to accept the simplistic claim that this policy merely protects Kenyan jobs. Kenya’s diaspora and migrant communities have become politically significant.

Kenyans abroad support families through remittances, finance businesses, educate relatives and sustain households. Many participate in political debates through social media, community networks and financial contributions. A substantial number want political change. Could a policy whose foreseeable consequence is retaliation against Kenyan workers and businesses elsewhere have political consequences beyond immigration?

I do not assert, without evidence, that retaliatory harm to Kenyan migrants is the government’s secret objective. But when a government adopts a policy whose predictable effects may jeopardise its citizens abroad, citizens are entitled to interrogate its wisdom and motives.

President Ruto and his advisers cannot plausibly claim ignorance of regional reciprocity. They understand diplomacy, the East African Community and migration in both directions. They know Kenyans work in countries whose citizens they now want removed from parts of our economy. They must understand retaliation is possible.

This is bigger than a Burundian selling tea in Nairobi. It may become an economic security question for Kenyan families. Imagine a Kenyan who invested savings in Kigali facing restrictions because Rwanda responds to Kenya’s treatment of Rwandans.

Imagine a Kenyan engineer in Kampala losing work because Uganda reserves jobs for Ugandans. Imagine Kenyan traders in eastern Congo becoming targets of retaliatory nationalism. Who compensates them? Who restores their businesses? Who explains that livelihoods became collateral damage in a political campaign at home?

Kenya should remember that xenophobia is difficult to control once legitimised from above. Today politicians distinguish between Kenyans and foreigners.

Tomorrow somebody distinguishes between communities, ethnicities or regions. Economic frustration becomes anger against neighbours rather than scrutiny of government.

That is convenient because the Burundian mason cannot explain Kenya’s Finance Act. The Ugandan mechanic cannot answer for corruption. The Congolese trader cannot explain public borrowing.

The Rwandan shopkeeper cannot account for the cost of living. Government can.

If foreigners violate immigration, licensing or work permit laws, enforce those laws individually and lawfully. If identification documents were fraudulently issued, investigate the officials and networks responsible.

If sectors require regulation, Parliament and agencies should regulate them constitutionally. Collective punishment and nationalist incitement are not economic policy.

A Kenyan who has spent years complaining about taxes, unemployment, corruption and declining purchasing power will not suddenly forget those problems because a Burundian waiter has been expelled.

President Ruto may believe he is redirecting anger. He may instead be exporting it. A policy advertised as protecting Kenyan livelihoods could destroy Kenyan livelihoods beyond our borders.

Parliament, civil society, business associations and regional institutions should demand answers. The question is not simply what happens to Burundians in Kenya.

It is what happens next to Kenyans in Burundi, Uganda, Rwanda, Congo and across Africa. When a government lights the fire of economic nationalism in an interconnected region, it cannot choose where that fire burns. The people ultimately burnt may be our own.