Intellectuals are free to take sides in politics

Dr David Ndii

Dr David Ndii, one of Kenya’s foremost economists, recently made clear his support for the opposition. This revelation was followed by a significant amount of complaints, many of them aimed at Ndii’s alleged betrayal of analytical integrity by taking political sides. The argument behind much of the complaining was the fact that objective analysis of economic facts ought to be done from an apolitical perspective and that Ndii had ceded his credibility by picking political sides.

This analysis is, of course, off the mark. The idea that academics and professionals of Ndii’s caliber ought to be apolitical is based on the erroneous assumption that facts are apolitical. They are not. By definition, facts tell us what the world is truly like. They inform how we view the world, which in turn informs how we engage in political action.