We, the citizens of the East African Community (EAC), and Africans committed to regional solidarity and cooperation, express concern regarding the manner in which recent measures affecting foreign informal small-scale traders are being communicated and implemented in Kenya.

We recognise Kenya’s legitimate sovereign right to regulate immigration, employment, taxation, and business activity, and to support local enterprise and national economic development. 

However, such measures must be lawful, proportionate, non-discriminatory, and consistent with Kenya’s obligations under the Constitution, the East African Community (EAC) Treaty, and the EAC Common Market Protocol.

Our concern is not that Kenya is enforcing its laws, but that legitimate regulation may be perceived or applied in ways that result in nationality-based exclusion, unequal treatment, or restrictions on the rights of citizens of other EAC Partner States. The EAC Common Market is founded on free movement, rights of establishment, and equal treatment of Partner States’ nationals. Efforts to promote local economic value should focus on job creation, value addition, skills development, and fair taxation rather than the automatic exclusion of lawfully operating citizens of neighbouring EAC States. This combination further offends Article 2 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which guarantees the enjoyment of rights without distinction of national or social origin. 

Following President William Ruto’s pronouncement that is understood to take effect on 7 September 2026, Kenya’s position is concerning to its friends and allies in Africa and globally. 

On 8 September 2026, State House announced a ninety-day window for foreign nationals to regularise their immigration and licensing status, and directed that the Local Content Bill, 2025 (National Assembly Bill No. 45 of 2025) be expanded to establish a framework governing participation in small-scale trade.

We welcome the ninety-day window and the government’s restated commitment to the East African Community and the African Continental Free Trade Area. This is a reprieve not a remedy. It is unfortunate that in these six days between the pronouncement and the deadline, hundreds of Burundian nationals queued outside their embassy in Nairobi for emergency travel documents, businesses closed, and traders reported threats, harassment and the loss of property from their homes.

Kenya’s commitment to regional solidarity is reflected in the Shirika Plan, a multi-year immigration management framework launched in March 2025. The Plan seeks to promote socio-economic inclusion through access to legal documentation, financial services, and labour markets, enabling individuals to become self-reliant alongside host communities. This approach is consistent with Kenya’s obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) to progressively realize the rights to work, social security, and an adequate standard of living, from which the State cannot retreat without compelling justification.

First, considering Article 104 of the EAC Treaty in this instance, other EAC citizens are not simply foreigners in the ordinary sense of immigration policy because of Kenya’s own commitment to facilitate free movement of people, labour, or services and rights to establishment or residence.

While this is subject to national laws, in so doing not making settlement of EAC citizens residence automatic or unconditional, the Local Content Bill 2025 as cited by the Principal Secretary for Foreign Affairs Dr Korir Singoei, is not intended nor in any way designed to deal with matters related to the enforcement of immigration policy in Kenya.

Further, the statement by the office of the Kenyan government spokesperson, Mr. Charles Owino, misconstrues the proposed legislative intent as a safeguard for the integrity of national identity systems.

This mischaracterizes the Bill’s focus on protecting local livelihoods and vulnerable sectors, rather than addressing the specific objectives and reasons outlined in the memorandum, which focuses on discussions around Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in Kenya.

Members of the public and relevant stakeholders should, therefore, be made aware that the aims of the Local Content Bill 2025 are to primarily:

1. Create a framework to regulate the inclusion of local industries in key economic sectors where foreign companies operating within Kenya’s borders -whilst still incorporated outside the country but who prefer to procure their goods; services; supplies are able to use/engage specialized workforce from other foreign entities.
2. Ensure that these foreign companies source their agricultural supplies from local farmers in support of the agricultural sector and improvement of livelihoods of Kenyan farmers by guaranteeing markets for their produce. 

Additionally, it seeks to: 

1. Promote the use of locally manufactured goods and services from local companies such as transport services; 
2. Avoid tax evasion by multinationals; 
3. Promote the use of locally available workforce;
4. Enhance the benefits harnessed from the supply chain;
5. Address the issues relating to transfer pricing; and 
6. Align with international standards such as the European Union (EU), which gives priority to goods and services originating from the EU.

Secondly, the presidential pronouncement was confusing because while the Local Content Bill 2025 is specific to formal sector operations, the singling out of Burundians (and the fear for other EAC citizens) contradicts implementation of the Shirika Plan. 

This is due to the unfair application towards the informal sector where most of fellow East African brothers and sisters seek sustenance. Local content does not simply mean “Kenyans Only” where EAC obligations exist. 

The criteria in enforcement of an existing immigration challenge cannot be raised, realised, or reassessed under the excuse of searching for trade opportunity quotas without a compatibility analysis with other member states under Kenya’s Common Market Protocol (CMP) obligations. 

Also, considering the Local Content Bill 2025 initial focus was to address concerns for the regulation of practices carried out by multinational companies, the presidential pronouncement undermines the use of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in uplifting Kenyan markets by conceptually changing the problem into a microenterprise issue about retail or informal trade activities by stating:

“Hatujajenga investor confidence ndio hawkers wakuje Kenya. Ile tumejenga ni for investors, si traders and hawkers,” (We will not build investor confidence to attract hawkers into Kenya. What we have built is for investors, not traders and hawkers).

This is not only discriminatory, in the eyes of the Kenyan constitution, but is also a bigger policy inconsistency where respectful, taxpaying, and law-abiding EAC citizens will be heavily penalised for immigration noncompliance that is essentially already being rectified by another existing policy as of March 2025. 

Meanwhile, the focus on the real persons of interest within mega financial; insurance; transport; warehousing; logistics; security; and construction services as identified in the bill is shifting away from them. 

In the event of such measures, it should be noted that a negative slump in Value Added Tax (VAT) would be a likely immediate effect, thereby only shocking already strained domestic revenue mobilization (DRM) efforts, but also resulting in a turn towards more punishing measures upon actual citizens to recoup lost revenues. 

It may also open Kenyan small businesses and informal traders across the region plus other African countries to retaliatory policies, or violent actions. 

This will thereby worsen the non-tariff barrier (NTB) environment by building suspicion among EAC member states who will be keen to offer similar protections to their own citizens thus setting up a downward spiral in a race to the bottom. 

Lastly, the policy debate will be well served by framing it as a “Value Addition” question as opposed to a “Citizen Entitlements” matter. 

In this respect Kenya will be able to properly address the balance of securing reasonable quotas with multinationals while building a productive society with an expanded tax base to continue helping in dealing with debt service obligations plus service delivery demands. 

This allows the government to address Kenyan concerns humanely within the confines of the law. 

Consequently, the government in collaboration with its other EAC counterparts should work to ensure integrated socio-economic inclusion through active participation and contribution of host Kenyan communities as per the stipulations of implementing the Shirika Plan. 

Members of the public should be made aware of the different legal or illegal categories, for both, EAC citizens or refugees within the law to accurately process their status without discrimination or harassment. 

Kenyans should also be properly sensitized on questions surrounding micro, macro, and multinationals enterprises in current local, national, or continental development contexts such as the EAC or the AfCFTA to prevent the explosion of xenophobic violence.

It would serve the Kenyan government and its citizens well to remember that anti-immigrant hatred has the potential to massively diminish the legacy and international stature for any country. 

Kenya should therefore work to jealously guard its humanitarian, social, business, diplomatic and overall economic reputation by nipping this negative trend in the bud. 

As Kenya gears towards hosting the to 2027 Africa Cup of Nations games together with Uganda and Tanzania, the country should work towards showcasing itself as an “Exemplar State” and reliable fulcrum for the region by offering a welcoming heart to its regional and continental compatriots.

We therefore call upon Kenya and all EAC Partner States to ensure that enforcement measures are transparent, evidence-based, and consistent with regional commitments, while advancing both national development and the shared goals of regional integration and prosperity. 

We urge the government of Kenya to clarify the policy position by offering direct specifics of policy implementation and offer assurances of safety, security, and stability to its neighbours. 

This will help end the creeping siege mentality or looming overzealous community crackdowns that will complicate relations with regional partners further.

THE END. 

Signed: 

1. The East African Tax and Governance Network (EATGN)
2. The Institute for Social Accountability (TISA)
3. Amnesty International Kenya
4. Inuka Kenya Ni Sisi!
5. Siasa Place
6. Bunge Mashinani Initiative 
7. PAWA254
8. Association of Media Women in Kenya
9. The East African Centre for Human Rights (EACHRights)
10. Centre for Economic Governance (CEG)
11. HumanIsMyID Alliance
12. Kenya Human Rights Commission
13. Budget Talk Global
14. Pan African Lawyers Union (PALU)
15. Africa Centre for People, Institutions and Society (ACEPIS)
16. African Forum and Network on Debt and Development (AFRODAD)
17. Southern and Eastern Africa Trade Information and Negotiations Institute (SEATINI) 
18. The Fikra Collective
19. Stop the Bleeding Campaign
20. Fight Inequality Alliance Kenya (FIA Kenya)
21. Dukingire Isi Yacu
22. Transparency International Kenya
23. ECONews Africa 

For information, contact mulayi.muni@tisa.or.ke or Ernest Cornel ecornel@khrc.or.ke