The old adage that “the children are our future” is often dismissed as sentimental rhetoric, but history repeatedly proves otherwise.
The phrase was immortalised in modern culture by Whitney Houston in her 1985 classic Greatest Love of All in which she sang with conviction that children should be taught well and allowed to “lead the way”.
Today’s Gen Z may not know Whitney or fully appreciate how culturally dominant she once was, but they are the very generation she was talking about — the children who are now grown.
Of course, every generation once occupied that role. From biblical times onward, societies have always produced younger cohorts destined to inherit power, even as older generations often dismissed them as inexperienced or naïve.
That tension has always existed in politics. Young people are frequently treated as politically immature until they suddenly become politically decisive.
Kenya itself has seen this before. One of the most consequential youth political mobilisations in history emerged in the early 1990s through the infamous Youth for Kanu ’92 movement, a political machine created to secure President Daniel arap Moi’s victory during the country’s first major multiparty election. Among the prominent figures associated with that operation was a young activist named William Ruto.
YK ’92 was not merely a youth movement in the modern civic sense. It was a political mobilisation structure built around patronage, propaganda, intimidation and financial inducements.
Flush with enormous resources, the movement distributed cash, organised rallies, dominated messaging spaces and aggressively framed Moi as the indispensable guarantor of stability when Kenya was entering uncertain democratic territory.
Critics long argued that the movement normalised transactional politics among the youth while weaponising economic desperation for political ends.
Yet YK ’92 also demonstrated something else: youth are not politically irrelevant spectators. They are instruments of power — either for reform or for entrenchment.
That is why today’s Gen Z voter registration trends matter far beyond raw numbers. Kenya entered the 2022 election with about 22 million registered voters, but youth registration significantly lagged behind the eligible population.
Millions of younger Kenyans who were eligible to vote never registered. The current registration drive has improved the numbers considerably, with more than 2.6 million new voters reportedly added since registration resumed.
But if Gen Z intends to shape the 2027 election rather than merely trend online between election cycles, registration must become a strategic political project rather than a symbolic civic exercise.
The key battlegrounds are obvious and there is no need to name them other than to say the Gen Z participation may prove more politically decisive than other demographics. But registration alone is insufficient.
Political organisation matters. The United Opposition cannot make the mistake of thinking that Gen Z’s frustration automatically translates into anti-government votes. History suggests otherwise. Youth anger is politically valuable only when it is structured, protected, financed, and converted into turnout.
And this is where the danger lies in underestimating Ruto.
Unlike the major principals in the United Opposition from which one may emerge as its flagbearer to take on the President, Ruto came of age politically inside one of the most sophisticated youth mobilisation operations Kenya has ever seen. He understands the mechanics of youth persuasion, patronage networks, political messaging and organisational discipline.
The United Opposition strategists should therefore not be surprised if, as 2027 approaches, elements of the old YK ’92 playbook re-emerge in modernised form: aggressive propaganda ecosystems, targeted financial inducements, digital influence campaigns, state-backed patronage and intimidation tactics designed both to fracture Gen Z cohesion and blunt opposition outreach.
History rarely repeats itself exactly. But it often echoes loudly enough for those paying attention. To pay attention now is to do what one might as well assume the United Opposition is doing under the radar.
What is curiously interesting — and this should be the warning ¾ is there doesn’t appear to be any thuggish, in-your-face efforts to frustrate, thwart or altogether defeat a surge in Gen Z voter registration. It’s a good thing, but it’s also a warning that someone may be sitting pretty somewhere waiting to play a card they know or are confident that once they play it, there won’t be a comeback.
