Kenya, under President William Ruto, is fast declining into a dictatorship leaning towards a failing state.

Civil society organisations yesterday issued a damning midterm assessment of Ruto’s administration, painting a bleak picture of deteriorating governance, rampant human rights violations, economic despair and systemic repression.

The report cited police brutality, political violence, economic mismanagement and the collapse of social services. “This is a state of national despair. We are witnessing a regime that is systematically dismantling democratic governance and civic freedoms,” the groups said.

Civil liberties have shrunk under the current administration, with CIVICUS, an international civil society monitor, downgrading Kenya’s civic space status from obstructed to repressed in 2024.

Citizens are dying in hospitals and the youth face police crackdowns for merely expressing dissent. Cases of police torture and media repression are alarming.

According to the report, between January and September 2023, the Independent Medico-Legal Unit documented 228 cases of police torture and 67 extrajudicial killings. The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights recorded 63 deaths and more than 600 injuries during Gen Z protests last year.

The lobby groups warned that the State has abandoned the rule of law. Disappearances, abductions and violent arrests have become normalised.

A least 26 Kenyans remain missing, allegedly abducted by security forces including the DCI, Anti-Terror Police Unit and National Intelligence Service.

Transparency International-Kenya sounded the alarm over increasing political intolerance, gang violence and gender-based attacks.

In 2024 alone, 579 femicide cases were recorded. This means more than 30 women are killed every month. All this due to State failure to protect women.

The agencies warned that rogue political elements, often shielded by the State, had disrupted peaceful meetings and protests, especially those critical of the government.

Universities are collapsing due to underfunding, and while the new university funding model was declared unconstitutional by the courts, the government insists on implementing it.

The health sector is in no better position, partly due to the shambolic transition from National Health Insurance Fund to the Social Health Authority that has left patients stranded, providers unpaid and the system in chaos.

This sorry situation can’t be allowed to continue. Citizens must speak up in defence of constitutionalism and the rule of law.