Is Africa experiencing a protest-led revolution?

Amid protests in Kenya, Uganda and Nigeria, some analysts say an ‘African Spring’ is in the making. Others say this is an incomplete story.

Not long after widespread, and deadly, protests against tax hikes rocked Kenya in June and forced a sharp government turnaround, Ugandans assembled for anti corruption protests, before Nigerians too began clamoring for demonstrations.

Many had watched captivating scenes on social media and on Kenyan news channels showing demonstrators storming the Parliament Building in the capital Nairobi on June 25. As lawmakers scampered into hiding, the angry protesters set fire to the building. They seized the ceremonial mace, symbolizing how power had changed hands, even as police rained bullets on them. It was a striking show of anger in a country long seen as a pillar of stability in East Africa.

On the opposite end of the continent, popular resentment for the Nigerian government threatened to erupt. Africa’s biggest economy has been brought to its knees in the past year as it scrapes through one of its worst economic crises. Under President Bola Tinubu, food prices have tripled, and many people are forced to reduce their meal rations or go hungry. In August, tens of thousands of people across the country took to the streets for 10 days, denouncing high living costs in protests tagged #EndBadGovernance, amid tear gas and bullets.

Days before Nigerians raged in the streets, police authorities swooped down on scores of young Ugandans who gathered in Kampala on July 23, raising placards denouncing corruption and calling for the sacking of problematic government officials. President Yoweri Museveni had banned protests before the action, warning agitators that they were “playing with fire”, and police sealed off all access roads to the parliament building. But the demonstrators gathered anyway. Some are still in detention.

The timing of the multi-country agitations, the palpable anger of the young people leading them, and the brutal responses by their governments have held the world transfixed. The seeming linearity of the events is prompting speculation that the wheels of something much bigger are already turning.

Some are asking: Has Kenya’s unusual fury triggered an African uprising?

The short answer: Experts are split. While some point to a connection between the three movements and other protests that have rocked other African countries in recent months, others say protests in a handful of countries cannot describe the situation across the continent. What they agree on though, is that Africa’s youth are angry and will continue voicing their dissatisfaction.

Kenyan protesters react during an anti government demonstration following nationwide deadly riots over tax hikes and a now-withdrawn finance bill in Kitengela, Kajiado county on July 16 [Monicah Mwangi/Reuters]

An ‘African Spring’ in the making?

Tunisian vegetable seller Mohammed Bouazizi’s self-immolation – out of frustration for being mistreated by security officials – was the spark that set the Arab world on fire in 2010, and kickstarted the uprising now known as the Arab Spring.

Tunisians, already angry at the rising cost of living, poured into the streets in angry weeks-long protest, forcing President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who’d led the country for 23 years, into exile. The demonstrations, aided by social media, spread like wildfire to other parts of North Africa and the Middle East, from Syria to Mauritania, as people protested not just hunger but autocratic rule. By the end, four rulers were deposed, while some regimes survived.

“The current situation in Kenya reminds me of the early days of the Tunisian uprising,” analyst Tafi Mhaka wrote on Al Jazeera. Like during the Arab Spring, social media has been crucial in recent protests, with young people mobilising on Twitter and TikTok and then taking those campaigns into the streets, motivated by shared feelings of betrayal by the political class.

“More than 10 years later, I suspect the same may now be happening in sub-Saharan Africa,” Mhaka added.

There are parallels between the early days of that revolution and the dissent manifesting in parts of Africa now, said Inge Amundsen, a researcher with Norway’s Chr Michelsen Institute. Like the Arab Spring, the protests shaking up Nigeria, Uganda and Kenya are primarily triggered by tough local economic conditions, but are also broadly against corruption and misgovernance, he said.

“Young people see the social and economic differences between those at the top and [themselves], the lack of opportunities for the majority,” the researcher said. “The rich people at the top, they’ve sort of pulled up the ladder, so there is no way for others to gain the same advantages.”

Protesters in Nigeria have pointed to plans by the government to buy President Tinubu a new jet, and the recent renovation of the vice president’s residence at 21 billion naira ($13m), as points of frustration.

In Kenya, politicians, who are among the highest paid in the world, regularly flaunt their wealth on social media – something akin to rubbing salt into wounds in a country that suffered eight years of drought until 2023, and where there’s a grating lack of jobs for young people. This has also fuelled public anger.

As demonstrators started to demand that President Ruto, along with a host of his cabinet members, resign in July, they also targeted the property of MP Zaheer Jhanda who had posted videos of his fleet of luxury rides in the past.

“Why would you show us your lavish lifestyle and still not do your job as a leader,” activist Rachel Stephanie Akinyi told the Reuters news agency at the time. “What are you trying to show us? ‘We have the power to use your money the way we want to, to take care of our own needs.’ But what about us?”

Nigerian demonstrators gather to protest against bad governance and economic hardship in Lagos on August 1 [Akintunde Akinleye/Reuters]

An incomplete story
Although there may be some similarities between the issues in different countries, some analysts say there is limited evidence that the recent protests are linked and that the narrative of an African Spring in the making does not tell a complete story.

For one, only three countries out of 54 on the continent are being referenced, and used to paint a blanket account of the entire continent, said Chris Ogunmodede, a political analyst focused on West Africa. That Nigerian protesters had taken direct inspiration from the Kenyan demonstrators is also contestable, he said, largely because Nigeria had seen pockets of protests before the August marches, even if they were not visible to an international audience.

“I don’t buy it one bit,” Ogunmodede said of the claims of an African uprising, adding that protests on the continent are not new or unique if one takes a longer view of history.

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