From Saba Saba to Gen Z: The years have passed but issues never been resolved

Rev Timothy Njoya during an interview at his home in Ngong, Kajiado County, on Tuesday, July 1, 2025. [Walter Owino, Standard]

A newspaper cutting hangs on the wall of a cluttered office that Reverend Timothy Njoya insists all guests must visit to sign a guest book.

“HORROR OF SABA SABA,” screams the framed front page of the July 8, 1997, issue of The East African Standard, hanging above a picture of Njoya with former Palestinian President Yasser Arafat.

“We were inside a bunker in Tunisia,” Njoya said excitedly, moments after finally locating the picture of the late Palestinian leader, described as a “comrade-in-arms” in Njoya’s memoir, We the People.

The 84-year-old cleric is more eager to have us see this picture than the newspaper headline that shows his head bloodied. He is more interested in showing the doodles he often scribbles, as the “orchestra” of things many would consider trash – like toilet seats and a water bottle that “once quenched my thirst” – suspended on the roof of his office block serenade him on windy days.

He prefers to follow his wife’s advice to keep such events in the past “and focus on now, and the future.” It is symbolic that such pictures from a bygone era are kept in the back, out of his direct view whenever he works at his desk, strewn with documents and paper towels and books.

Njoya’s bloody face is the result of a violent clash with the police a day before the image was published. The retired Presbyterian cleric had been among pro-reform agitators attacked by the police at the All Saints Cathedral, where most sought refuge after they were dispersed from Nairobi’s Uhuru Park, the venue of a Saba Saba rally that demanded electoral reforms ahead of elections slated for later that year.

Such rallies had followed the first Saba Saba, staged on July 7, 1990, by politicians and activists agitating for the return of a multi-party democracy. ‘Saba Saba’, which translates to ‘Seven Seven’, is drawn from the July 7 date – the seventh day of the seventh month.

It had not been Njoya’s first experience with brutality. It was not going to be his last. Not in an era underlined by State paranoia. Fifteen years earlier, former President Daniel Moi had survived an attempted coup by elements within Kenya’s Air Force, weeks after Kenya had become a one-party state. Any act of dissent since sent the establishment into a panic.

Nights in ICU beds and broken bones were a price too meagre to pay for a cause Njoya believed was just. Many more had paid with their lives. He lived. And so he would keep fighting. In Church, where he preached stinging sermons against the state’s excesses, and on the streets, where his body bore the brunt of a fight for meaningful constitutional reform.

“We were fighting for democracy… a system in which everyone takes care of everyone,” said Njoya, who does not revisit the past much.

Rev Timothy Njoya being roughed up by police during Saba Saba protests in 1990. [File]

Tomorrow, Kenya’s youth could well hit the repeat button. They could re-enact July 7, 1990, when thousands of Kenyans poured into streets across major cities to demand pluralism in the first Saba Saba march.

They could stage protests as grand as those witnessed days ago, on June 25, organised to commemorate last year’s Generation Z demonstrations against controversial tax increases, which were equally, if not, bigger.

Perhaps they could “celebrate” Saba Saba, as Njoya would wish they do, but cannot since “Gen-Z are fighting against regression and retrogression.”

“Commemorations, like birthdays and marriages, are celebrations,” he said. “We have been denied celebration of our Saba Saba and independence. Instead of celebrating, our young people are on the streets.”

Last year, mobilisers of the Gen Z protests that convulsed Kenya held a concert at Uhuru Park on Saba Saba. Theirs was not a celebration, but a memorial concert that saw more chanting of anti-President William Ruto slogans than actual singing.

On social media, the hashtag Saba Saba has been a top trend for days, growing more popular with the death of Boniface Kariuki, a mask vendor who was recently shot in the head by a police officer at close range, unprovoked.

Equally significant is Albert Ojwang’s burial on Friday. The 30-year-old teacher, brutally murdered in police custody a month ago, would be turning 31 tomorrow. He was born on the historic Saba Saba, a day that means a lot to the second liberation struggle, but whose significance would probably be lost on the late Ojwang’ and many in his generation, whose interaction with the day has only been through history lessons.

Still, joining the Saba Saba protests, a section of youth who attended Ojwang’s funeral in Homa Bay has said, would be a befitting tribute to a man who paid the ultimate price to expose the deep rot in Kenya’s police service and the half-heartedness of the State to ensure justice for victims of police brutality.

“We will do Saba Saba for Albert Ojwang’,” one of them declared in a viral video clip.

The result of such plans, the most consequential, at least, is almost certain. Death. It is a price that at least 19 paid on June 25, when police countered protesters with live rounds, tear gas and water cannons

Two victims of the commemorative protests, Brian Maina and Joseph Ndiang’ui, were buried on Friday. They died seeking justice for the more than 63 young people who died in last year’s uprising and protesting Ojwang’s chilling murder.

Martin Shikuku addresses the crowd at Kamukunji with James Orengo during the first Saba Saba rally in July 7, 1990. [File, Standard]

Public anger at Ruto’s government has been intense since he proposed new taxes last year, essentially forced on him by Kenya’s dire public debt situation, inherited from former President Uhuru Kenyatta, but which Ruto has been digging deeper into. Worse still, Ruto preaches austerity as his allies display opulence.

Amid demands for better governance, the Head of State chose the political way out, co-opting former Prime Minister Raila Odinga’s allies into the Executive, which earned him a brief respite.

The tide is turning. In Homa Bay, where Ruto should enjoy some peace and quiet courtesy of his truce with Raila, young Kenyans razed down the police station where Ojwang’ was first taken when he was arrested last month. Some youth would chant “Ruto must go” during the teacher’s burial.

The agitation for justice, good governance and pro-democracy reforms is not unique to the current political era. Indeed, Njoya and many others in the second liberation struggle wanted more freedoms and an end to systemic corruption and cronyism within the government.

Similarly, they clapped back against efforts to stifle dissent, such as detentions of government critics without trial and the police brutality that had been normalized.

Such ills had been passed down from the colonial government that unleashed terror on native Kenyans to keep frustrations muted. The first post-independence government has been accused of replacing colonial masters and betraying the cause of the liberation struggle.

Indeed, the independence struggle promised prosperity for Kenyans and an end to the repression and marginalization of the colonial days. This promise was broken in the early days of independence, with allies of founding President Jomo Kenyatta benefitting amassing grand wealth and huge swathes of land that should have been repatriated to the people.

“We do not want a Kenya of ten millionaires and ten million beggars,” veteran politician Josiah Mwangi (JM) Kariuki, himself wealthy, protested the unjust system of entrenched marginalisation. He was assassinated in 1975 like many other government critics in his era and in others that followed.

The second liberation struggle of the 1980s and 1990s, rooted in the fight for the liberties won from Kenya’s colonial masters, ushered in pluralism and the introduction of presidential term limits. It eventually inspired the successful push for a Constitution hailed globally as being among the most progressive.

Still, the Constitution’s safeguards, such as fundamental rights to life and picketing, are increasingly violated. Days ago, Interior Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen issued illegal shoot-on-sight orders to police officers targeting anyone storming a police station.

Protesters hang on KBS bus during the Saba Saba demonstrations in Nairobi on July 7, 1990. [File, Standard]

In a video clip widely circulated on social media, Murkomen would tell some senior officers that he would not have minded had they used “bullets” on protesters, assuring protection and non-cooperation with possible investigation of misconduct.

Such reckless remarks push Njoya to the conclusion that Ruto’s administration is more retrogressive and regressive than the one that clobbered him several times.

“…even than Mobutu’s. We were elected to stand for and represent three things: sovereignty of the people, human life and freedom… We elected a government to protect that. Life is God-given, not a privilege by the government. Sovereignty is God-given. He gave human beings dominion over the earth. To enjoy the two, you need freedom,” the cleric said.

He argued that Kenya's democracy had lost its soul with the breakdown in oversight and the trading off of the pulpit to politicians by a section of the clergy.

Gitobu Imanyara, a lawyer and journalist who served as a lawmaker for Central Imenti, concurred, highlighting his experiences in the second liberation struggle, in which he played a critical role.

“Even in the worst day of the one-party era, the right of habeas corpus (a court order requiring a detainee to be presented before a judge) was never taken away… and the state never denied holding Kenyan citizens in custody. They would give lame excuses and charge people with flimsy charges… there was an attempt to follow the letter of the law, not the spirit… There are no such pretences, abductions are at night,” said Imanyara.

Indeed, state-sanctioned abductions have replaced detention without trial. Former Attorney General Justin Muturi’s account that the National Intelligence Service had abducted his son, Lesley Muturi, at the height of last year’s protest exposed the government’s involvement in kidnappings, despite repeated denials.

Instead of implementing progressive policies, the government has moved to shrink civil liberties. Nairobi Women Representative Esther Passaris has proposed a state-backed bill that would limit the right to protest.

In this way, the government is borrowing a leaf from the old era, which saw provisions limiting rights, such as detention without trial, made law.

“It is interesting that 30-something years later, the more things change the more they remain the same,” said Imanyara. “They actually don’t remain the same. Freedom has its own ups and downs. It comes in increments and the struggle continues.”

In the absence of a law, the state continues to use the police as an agent of suppression. Time without number, the police service has illegally outlawed protests and cordoned off areas like Nairobi’s central business district to prevent demonstrations.

Similarly, they have curtailed movement into the city, blocking major highways and roads that lead to Kenya’s capital, a move reminiscent of the colonial Kipande system, which allowed limitations on movement.

Martin Shikuku addresses the crowd at Kamukunji with James Orengo during the first Saba Saba rally in July 7, 1990. [File, Standard]

The free press also finds itself targeted with threats of shutdown, recently for covering the June 25 demos live. There are proposals for tough regulations on social media, some of which could potentially offend privacy rights.

“You have been going round this mountain for too long. It is time to move forward. Go to your promised land. The Constitution promised us the promised land,” Nyoya said, a message directed at the political elite that he said must now seek progress. "They are not irredeemable. I wouldn't be a man of God if I thought they were."

History offers mixed results for similar pushes. On the one hand, there is the reality that the country has been on a forever quest to attain the ‘dreams’ of its founding fathers and liberation heroes, rooted in the respect and enjoyment of freedoms.

Such are the concerns that Kevin Makokha, a Gen-Z who participated in the most recent protests, bears. He said he did not believe the demonstrations would achieve much because “Ruto doesn’t listen.”

“Even if he doesn’t listen we must continue shouting so that he knows we are not happy with him,” Makokha said during the demos.

Gitile Naituli, a professor of leadership and management, said Ruto could listen, “but had chosen to surround himself with people who are not willing to be truthful to him.

“He surrounded himself with sycophants. In governance… never allow a situation where you are the most intelligent person in the room. Get people with dissenting views who can tell you when you go wrong,” Prof Naituli said on KTN’s Unfiltered podcast on Thursday.

On the flip side, there are encouraging outcomes. The independence struggle birthed a new nation. The second liberation ushered in significant leaps in constitutionalism.

With such protests, “the only language the government understands,” according to Alans Ademba, a young journalism student who attends the demos, comes the hope for impactful change. These are the lessons Imanyara argues the youth should draw from the history of Saba Saba, which he believes is relevant to the Gen-Z movement.

Seven years before Njoya’s image immortalized the horror of police brutality, politicians and activists demanding a return to pluralism staged countrywide protests, whose planned epicentre was the Kamukunji Grounds, cordoned off by police officers.

More than 20 people died on that July 7, 1990 day. The protests were a crucial turning point in Kenya’s re-adoption of multiparty politics, achieved a year later in 1991. Kenya conducted its first multi-party elections in 1992, although the country still pursues electoral credibility.

Imanyara, bears the scars of the liberation struggle, having endured arrest and torture, was among those who dared to challenge the oppressors.

 “Liberation movements are always led by the youth. They do not result in the immediate enjoyment of the liberation they have fought for, but, in time, they succeed,” said Imanyara, asserting that Ruto would not win the "third liberation" fight.