Kenyan police face off against protesters day after president's tax climbdown
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00:00Protesters and police continue to clash in Kenya.
00:03Despite the president's backing down from controversial tax hikes,
00:07William Ruto withdrew the controversial bill on Wednesday
00:10following a crackdown on protests that saw at least 23 people killed.
00:14For the latest, we can cross now to Olivia Bizot in Nairobi.
00:18Olivia, you've been going around the capital today.
00:21What have you been seeing?
00:22Yes, protesters said on social media that they would gather here in Nairobi today,
00:32and they have.
00:33It's difficult to estimate the amount of numbers of protesters who are here today.
00:39There were definitely a lot less people than on Tuesday,
00:41but that's also because security and police officers
00:46made it incredibly difficult for protesters to gather.
00:49Every time large groups started to form, they would fire tear gas.
00:53They also fired rubber bullets and even some live bullets today here as well.
00:58The security officers also targeted journalists.
01:02We received a huge amount of tear gas, and it was incredibly difficult to do our jobs
01:07and to understand where the tear gas would be fired.
01:11It seemed like it was being done quite randomly.
01:14So it ended up becoming a sort of game of cat and mouse
01:18between the protesters and the security officers.
01:21It almost seemed like the police forces didn't want the protest to happen at all
01:29and wanted to stop anything from happening before it could even start.
01:34There were ambulances who were here as well,
01:37who were sort of roaming around the streets to pick up any of the protesters
01:41who were injured from the tear gas and from those rubber bullets.
01:47Even though there weren't a huge amount of protesters
01:51who were able to gather here in Nairobi,
01:53people have been mobilizing a lot on social media
01:56and demonstrations have been taking place across the country today.
02:00Now, Olivia, President Ruto announced on Wednesday
02:02he wouldn't sign that controversial tax bill.
02:04It seemingly, though, has not quelled the protesters' anger.
02:08What are people asking for now? What's next?
02:10Yes, it seems that the protests have now gone beyond the finance bill.
02:14People that I spoke to today said that the finance bill was actually just a trigger,
02:19but the anger is a lot more deep-rooted than just anger towards that finance bill.
02:24They're now calling on Ruto to step down.
02:28They want him out of the government and they are angry towards the whole of...
02:33They're angry towards everyone who is involved in this.
02:37They're angry towards everyone who is in power.
02:40They're angry about the increasingly high cost of living here in Kenya
02:45and how difficult it is to make a living,
02:48about the high levels of unemployment as well.
02:51It's difficult to predict how long these protests will go on for.
02:55What's different this year compared to protests in previous years
02:59is that these ones are being led by the masses
03:01as opposed to a particular politician.
03:03Similar protests did take place last year after the 2023 finance bill was announced,
03:11but they were led by the main opposition figure, Raila Odinga,
03:14and that made it easier for Ruto to negotiate with a politician
03:18in order to quell the protests.
03:20This year there isn't anyone that he can negotiate with,
03:22so it's difficult to predict what will happen,
03:25so we'll definitely have to see how this situation develops.