President William Ruto has made a dramatic and embarrassing U-turn on his directive to expel foreigners from Kenya, backtracking after facing a fierce and unified backlash from Kenyans who refused to allow their country to be dragged down the dark path of xenophobia.
Just a week ago, Ruto stood at State House Nairobi while hosting a group of small-scale business owners from Nairobi and issued what sounded like an ultimatum against foreigners engaged in small businesses in the country, ordering them to vacate Kenya.
The remarks sent immediate shockwaves through the foreign community living in the country. Burundian and Congolese citizens rushed to their respective embassies in large numbers, desperately seeking permits and documentation in anticipation of a crackdown that Ruto’s words suggested was imminent.
But the President had badly misjudged the mood of his own people.
Rather than rallying behind the directive, Kenyans across the political divide pushed back hard, accusing Ruto of deliberately fanning xenophobia and drawing uncomfortable comparisons with the South African government, which earlier this year incited its citizens against foreign nationals in scenes that descended into deadly violence, leaving several Nigerians and other foreigners killed with little to no protection from President Cyril Ramaphosa’s administration.
Kenyans made clear they wanted no part of that script. Online and in public discourse, the overwhelming sentiment was that foreigners contribute positively to Kenya’s economy, promote trade, and are part of the country’s long tradition of inclusivity and regional harmony. Even opposition leaders added their voices to the pushback, leaving Ruto politically isolated on a position he had staked out with apparent confidence just days earlier.
Faced with that wall of resistance, Ruto quietly retreated. Speaking in Kericho County on Saturday, the President delivered a statement that stood in stark contrast to what he had said at State House the previous week.
“Foreign nationals are free to work in Kenya, and no citizen has a right to harm or mistreat them,” Ruto said, in remarks that drew a line under his earlier decree but also confirmed that the original directive had been a miscalculation of significant proportions.
For a president who has struggled to unite Kenyans behind him on virtually every major issue, attempting to do so through the politics of exclusion and fear was always going to be a gamble. It failed, and the speed of the reversal tells you everything about how badly it landed.
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