It is official. It is now fashionable to blame everything wrong with our society on the middle class populace in Nairobi.
You have heard it before: They don’t save, they live above their means, they are spenders buying non essential, they do not vote but complain on twitter, they don’t heckle in the streets when we need them to, they don’t show up for state function at Nyayo Stadium, they aren’t seen in NASA rallies, they are selfish, they have huge loans they are paying and have borrowed accents, they are out of touch with the ground, they litter and they are just after fun. They live in gated communities, and have private solutions to public issues such as trash, water and education.
In many ‘middle-class-are-to-blame-articles’ they are not usually described by the scientific definition; that is, on income and expenditure, but they are judged by which places they eat lunch, how they talk and how they dress.
Take any person who is well dressed and walking in the streets of Nairobi, anyone would qualify them as middle class, regardless of the job status and lack of their income statistics. You are seen drinking coffee in a high end pavement restaurant and suddenly you are labelled middle class.
And that is the problem with the tag ‘middle class’. It is now a perception and a stereotype, not a science and that is why we need to totally retire that term! The numerous complaints about the ‘middle class’ in Kenya are really not motivated by facts on the ground, or recent research, or fully quantified surveys.
The term ‘middle class’ now is being thrown in many conversations carelessly, in a bid to try and blame someone or something on the many ills in our society.
No one knows who the middle class are
Who are the middle class really? It really depends on which blog you read or which seminar you attend. There is never a definite answer on who they are. That goal post seems to be shifting depending on which issues we want to tackle.
One blog said that Nairobi’s middle class are broke and fake. (Notwithstanding the irony in that sentiment: If they are fake and broke then they are not middle class). The writer went on to say that people who work in downtown Nairobi are wealthier than these middle class. Wouldn’t that make them middle class as well? Do they have the same stereotypical facets of the Nairobi middle class? Truth be told, we are confused about who the middle class is.
The most recent data analysis on middle class in Kenya is found in the Moody’s 2016 research. Here is what the research projected on how big the middle class is in Kenya:
In 2014 only 800,000 people were considered to be in the middle class bracket (both lower middle class and the proper middle class). For the proper middle class, their annual income stretches from Kshs 850,000 to Kshs 4.2 million.
Kenya National Bureau of Statistics puts middle class as household that spend between Kshs 24,000 and Kshs 120,000 per month. Later data by KNBS in 2015 said that 64 percent of the Kenyan workforce earned low wages (between Kshs20,000 and Kshs 49,000). It is all up in the air!
In my own estimation, the Moody’s research above gave much clearer picture of the middle class. But more recent and relevant research is needed. However, both KNBS and Moody’s research show that the middle class number is small.
We have a society problem not a middle class problem
During last election (2013) the buzz word was the youth. Everyone was talking about the youth this, the youth that. Some said the youth were not tribal and they needed change. The told us it is time for the youth to lead! But since the tribal bigotry and corruption has followed the same youth, the buzz around it doesn’t hold the glitter it did. But now we have a shiny word to dance around with – Middle Class.
Why do we always want to blame our problems on some group of people, but never own our problems as a unified society? The problems our country is facing is leadership issues not middle class.
Regardless of class, everyone has the obligations to vote in leaders with integrity. It cannot be left to a group of people. If Nairobi is sinking in trash and disorganization, all of us are to blame! Everyone of us, from top earners to minimum wage folks, need lessons on how to manage money and not waste it and how not to get into debt – it is not just a middle class problem.
If someone deems it fit to buy chicken at 4,000 shillings, he or she harvests the benefits and disadvantages of that decision. There is no law on where to dine or how much food should be retailed at. It is not a middle class problem, those are personal conviction issues.
We cannot honestly depend on less than 1 percent of the population to make ‘wise’ leadership decisions. The over 90 percent have the same responsibility. A middle class vote does not miraculously multiply into five. Everyone has only one vote, the rich, the middle class and the low income groups.
Kenyans need to own up their mistakes and not to seek people to blame. Retire the term middle class, not unless used in a scientific way.