Unemployment Drives Youth to Voter Apathy

By Edgar Obare

Campaigns for the recently concluded referendum on a new constitution for Kenya kicked off on a high note, mostly targeting youth. With the government rolling out the most intensive civic education in the country’s history, local artistes who were roped in spared no efforts in using edutainment to rally the youth to support the proposed constitution which has since been passed by an overwhelming majority.

In a measure aimed at ensuring that Kenyans turned out in large numbers to cast their votes at the plebiscite, President Mwai Kibaki declared August 4th a public holiday.

NewsfromAfrica set out on an assignment to cover this historic moment in Kenya’s history. The journey took us to Embakasi Primary School, one of the designated polling stations in Embakasi constituency in the eastern part of Nairobi, the country’s capital city. Embakasi is a run down dusty public school that locals say is awaiting refurbishment as soon as the tied funds from the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) kitty are released.

But as the rest of the eligible citizens queued to cast their votes, a group of youth nonchalantly stood by the roadside. Though they have attained majority age that would enable them to exercise their franchise, they opted to remain passive spectators in an exercise that otherwise recorded the highest voter turnout in recent times.

Grace, 19, said she did not have a voter’s card, having failed to register as a voter during the entire period set aside for the exercise by the Interim Independent Electoral Commission (IIEC).

“I was out and about and it must have skipped my mind completely”, she said. So she sat idly with her friends chatting and laughing as the rest of Kenyans made history.

Just outside the classrooms where voting was going on under the watchful eyes of the paramilitary General Service Unit (GSU),  Odhiambo, 21, told NewsfromAfrica that this was his first time to vote and he was excited about it. He had just voted in favour of the proposed new constitution and was quite vocal about it but admitted to not reading the document.

 “The document was too large and I didn’t have the time; besides opinion polls predicted it would pass,” he said. He scampered off to his friends with glee on his face that he had voted.

Ondieri, 23, also walked out of the polling stream soon after casting his vote. Asked whether he voted for or against the proposed constitution, he happily replied that he opposed the document.

“Why do you ask? Look at it this way; everyone was voting in favour of the new constitution, so I voted against it to see if it would affect the outcome”, he said.

A day later, Kenyans endorsed the proposed constitution, with an overwhelming 69 per cent voting for it. Why the youth show such apathy and indifference to the going ons in their country can be largely attributed to all the problems they face. They consider themselves a marginalized group having no access to job and other opportunities.

Unemployment in Kenya stands at 40 per cent, with the country ranked as 185th globally. The youth comprise the majority of this percentage.

It does not help matters that these youth who come from poverty stricken families abandon their education to look for jobs to feed and provide for their families. To them, the family comes first.

Odhiambo 19, quit school when he was in Form 2 (second year of high school education) due to lack of school fees and went straight into employment. He went to the neighbouring Uganda and started fishing to earn a living. Most youths from poor backgrounds go into blue collar jobs if they’re lucky, with the only documentation being required is a national  identity card.

Odhiambo wittingly quips in his national language, Kiswahili:  “Kazi kwa vijana, mshahara kwa wazee”.  It means that the young do all the work and the old men and women get paid lump sums for their (youth’s) hard work.

Like many of his age-mates, Odhiambo did not cast his vote at the referendum, citing family responsibilities that would not allow him to take a day off his hand cart business in the sprawling Gikomba open air market.

With the new constitution set to be promulgated on August 27, the youth can only hope that their standards of living will be elevated as enshrined in the document.