The People Dialogue Festival (PDF) was birthed as a follow up to the political truce between the former President of Kenya Uhuru Kenyatta and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga which culminated in a ‘handshake’ on March 9, 2018, according to Tracey Osogo, Programs Officer at CMD-Kenya and Team Lead for PDF. Their truce ended months of political tension witnessed after the 2017 general elections. PDF was thus conceptualized to foster dialogue among political actors, giving them a platform to engage with each other and with citizens who are the consumers of their policies
In the March of every year since the Center for Multiparty Democracy (CMD- Kenya) has brought together multiple stakeholders including government actors, civil society organizations(CSOs) and community groups, donor networks, international actors (such as embassies) researchers, and ordinary citizens for the People Dialogue Festival. The event gives these actors the opportunity to interact with each other, develop partnerships, and engage citizens on pertinent issues through open and interactive dialogue.
This year’s event was held at Uhuru Park in Nairobi from March 5th to 8th. As Busara we hosted and attended various sessions through our Governance and Accountability as well as our Social Stability teams to demonstrate how behavioral science can be applied in governance, from citizen engagement, to public participation and policy formulation. The teams hosted and attended various sessions, interacting with other stakeholders and citizens.
I attended several sessions and spoke to different people to understand why the event is important in the current political environment. It is at one of these sessions that I happened upon Tracey Osogo who highlighted that the festival aims to give people a space where they can come and interact with their leaders while giving leaders the chance to interact with the people who consume and are impacted by their decisions, such as when they increase taxes.
It is probably with this aim in mind that they selected the venue for this year’s festival. Uhuru park has witnessed key events in the making of the Kenyan state and has been a stage for Kenyan politics including multiple rallies that shifted the country’s political landscape. For instance, 14 years ago thousands of Kenyans witnessed the promulgation of Kenya’s new constitution at Uhuru Park in August 2010. In my conversation with Tracey, she mentioned that the choice of holding the event this year was both a logistical and a strategic decision. From a logistics perspective, the Park is easily accessible to people coming from all corners of Nairobi. Strategically, the Park is at the centre of Kenyan politics–from the Park, Parliament Buildings are visible alongside other government buildings where key decisions that impact Kenyans are made.
This juxtaposition is especially stark when one considers the protests that started last year in June, when young Kenyans took to the streets, triggered by dissatisfaction with the Finance Bill 2024 which sought to increase taxes. Their dissatisfaction became a call for accountability within government, particularly on public spending. One can argue that the escalation of the protests was triggered by the nonchalant attitude of the peoples’ representatives–members of parliament(MPs) failed in their duty to represent the interests, and voices of the people. For weeks, Kenyans tried different techniques to air their dissatisfaction with the bill, including sharing contact details of MPs online to pressure them to reject the bill. In the end, citizens’ voices were too loud to be ignored. The government responded by withdrawing the bill and reshuffled the cabinet. Holding the event in the heart of Nairobi at Uhuru Park, and a few minutes from Parliament can be interpreted as creating the necessary bridge, reconciling the people and their representatives–by giving them a chance to hold open dialogue.
When elected officials in Kenya come into office, they distance themselves from people for different reasons. One study found that, individuals often run for office not primarily to serve the community, but to win elections and gain access to benefits and patronage networks, which facilitate personal enrichment. Some voters also expect handouts from their elected representatives and do not understand the role of different officials. This might explain why state officials create distance with the citizens. This limits feedback, a key component of a good governance system, creates frustration, and apathy among citizens. If meaningful public participation was conducted during the passage of the 2024 Finance Bill, the government might have predicted the level of dissatisfaction and amended it before the escalation. This takes me to my third point.
On March 5th, Busara hosted a panel discussion on what motivates citizens to engage in a democracy. The conversation centered on what meaningful engagement looks like. Twaweza’s Director of Learning and Strategy Baruani Mshale, who was one of the panelists, observed that most governments at the national and local levels within East Africa have downplayed the role of citizens in policy making, often using a top-down approach. For instance, officials will present technical documents that are difficult for ordinary citizens to understand and expect them to give feedback on time. He also mentioned that officials use performative forms of engagement to induce participation. In his view, the danger with this approach is that while public participation may seem to happen on paper, the outcomes are often predetermined, undermining the benefits of citizens’ feedback that is necessary in good policy making. Good policies fail because the views of policy consumers are ignored by policymakers.
When citizens are ignored, they fall into two main groups, the disenfranchised and the disgruntled. This was pointed out by another panelist Joy Mwaniki, the Governance Manager at Shujaaz Inc, who observed that when citizens feel that their voices are not heard; they might use alternative forms of engagement out of frustration such as witnessed during the Gen-Z protests.
What then, should meaningful citizen engagement look like?
In East Africa, it is often the case that engagement ends with elections. Active engagement goes beyond elections and includes the work of community groups, empowering citizens with the right tools to advocate for issues that are significant to them. Meaningful engagement encompasses direct engagement such as community meetings, active civic education, helping citizens understand complex policy issues. This was pointed out by Gideon Too, Busara’s Vice President of Research and Advisory during the panel discussion. Gideon was reflecting on Busara’s expertise in offering capacity strengthening to community groups and CSOs to empower citizens with political agency to engage with their representatives. This breaks down the power dynamics that make it harder for ordinary citizens to engage in governance.
The phenomenon has been studied by Menocal and Sharma (2008) among others who observed that strengthening citizen voices and enhancing accountability can drive progress toward development goals, such as ending poverty, enabling shifts in public policies, practices, behaviors, and power dynamics. Ultimately citizens are more willing to engage when they feel empowered, and when they feel that their choices and voices can make a difference. This point was reiterated by all the speakers and became a rallying call to governments to shift towards citizen driven participatory governance. Brenda Ogutu, who leads our work in governance and accountability added that the most crucial element of getting citizens feedback is to know what matters most to them at different times to enhance the policy making processes. When the economy is struggling, for instance, figuring out how to bring money to people’s pockets might be more of a priority than building a road, and this can only be achieved by harnessing dialogue–giving people a chance to voice their frustrations.
Towards the end of the conversation, participants (among which the majority were youth), challenged stakeholders to think about the danger of ignoring the voices of the people. One participant mentioned that protests are more likely to happen and Kenya might end up with civil unrest if leaders keep ignoring the challenges the youth face. My final observation here is that a new generation of tech savvy, educated citizens, who have political agency will raise their voices. It is crucial for the government, and other stakeholders to listen to these voices with an open mind, and tap into their passion and co-create solutions to the challenges facing these young people such as unemployment, and high cost of living.
Away from the panel discussion, we engaged over a hundred participants through a collaboration with Twaweza East Africa. For three days, participants came to our booth to learn about behavioural science. Specifically, we worked with Twaweza to show these participants how they could improve their messaging. Twaweza would ask them to write messages to their future selves, reflecting on the Kenya they would like to see in 2050. We (Busara) would then invite these participants to test the efficacy and relevance of these messages, and drawing lessons from our low cost message testing guidebook, rewrite these messages. To sample some of these messages, one participant wrote three words “It is well.’’ When I asked this participant what they meant, and if they would understand the same message in 25 years; they realised it would be difficult to remember what they meant. Through message testing, we were able to show the participant why having a clear message is crucial, so that it can be understood, and drive action. When we rewrote the new message, it read, “It is well, you are living in a country with a thriving economy where Kenyans are happy because you were willing to raise your voice in 2025 to say what was wrong.”
Overall, these activities could only happen because the design of the People Dialogue Festival is to facilitate dialogue, co-creation sessions, creating a fertile ground for creativity, thinking and collaboration. PDF is a unique platform to foster dialogue among leaders, stakeholder groups and citizens. For us to achieve sustainable development, and a thriving society, stakeholders have to rethink their models of citizen engagement. Open forums such as the People Dialogue Festival can help to break down the structural barriers that limit meaningful engagement. That means a regular citizen can challenge their Senator, a Governor, and MPs on policy issues such as taxation, as we witnessed during the PDF.
The power difference between elected representatives and the people limits meaningful participation. While policymakers collect views of the public during the formulation of policies, what they miss is the dialogue element that can only happen when people are willing to let their guard down and engage in honest, and deep conversation. The other benefit of open dialogue is that the representatives can explain what their mandate is to their constituents by engaging citizens directly. For instance, members of parliament, including senators can explain their legislative and oversight role, while members of the executive branch such as governors, and cabinet members can explain their policy implementation agenda, and reduce the complexity and the cost of governance. I will definitely be attending PDF in 2026.
References
Kanyinga, K., & Mboya, T. (2021). The cost of politics in Kenya. London: Westminster Foundation for Democracy.
Rocha Menocal, A., & Sharma, B. (2008). Joint evaluation of citizens’ voice and accountability: Synthesis report. London, UK: Department for International Development
