When President William Ruto signed a decree on February 5, 2025, announced at Orahey Grounds in Wajir Town, stating that Kenyan Somalis would no longer undergo extra vetting to obtain national identity cards, the decision was hailed as historic.1. It signaled an end to the decades-old practice of forcing youths from northern Kenya to prove their lineage through a lengthy committee scrutiny.2

An exhaustive vetting process had systematically cast Kenyan Somalis as outsiders within a state where national identity had historically depended on bureaucratic approval rather than recognized birthright.3, Yet history has shown that ending vetting, while important, may not heal the wounds of exclusion and marginalization that Kenya’s Somali citizens have endured for decades as ‘citizens on probation.’4

A Colonial Inheritance and the Shifta War

The suspicion that shaped Kenya’s national ID vetting system is rooted in the colonial administration of the Northern Frontier District (NFD), which comprised six districts.5 Under the Special Districts Ordinance of 1926, Somalis needed passes to move across their own grazing lands.6 These restrictions turned everyday survival into a potential security threat, disrupting access to pasture and cross-border trade.7

For the British colonial state, the frontier was never viewed as part of Kenya proper, but as a buffer zone to be contained rather than developed. The postcolonial state inherited the colonial logic.8 At independence, when the NFD voted overwhelmingly to secede and join Somalia, the Kenyan government dismissed the result. The ensuing Shifta War (1963-1967) deepened fears that Somali identity was synonymous with disloyalty. The state militarized the north, imposed emergency laws, and carried out collective punishments.

The perception of the existence of a potential threat of Somali disloyalty did not end with the war. In the 1980s, state violence reached new heights with the Garissa massacre of 1980 and the Wagalla massacre of 1984.9 These atrocities left deep and lasting scars, and reinforced the idea that Somali identity in Kenya was always in question.

What began as suspicion soon evolved into policy, with the initiation of a nationwide Somali screening exercise.10 While presented as an administrative safeguard, in reality, it was a test of loyalty. Applicants without written birth records or proof of their grandparents’ true identities were denied Kenyan identity cards.11 The colonial practice of rendering Somalis “visible” through passes and permits was restructured into ID vetting, a system that functioned as an ethnic filter.

Conditional ‘Citizenship’ Beyond the Somali Case

The practice of treating an entire community as ‘citizens on probation’ is not unique to Kenyan Somalians. In my research on the Mbeere community during the Mau Mau insurgency, I found a similar pattern. The colonial government branded the Mbeere as “loyalists” and rewarded them with selective development projects, including irrigation schemes, cattle dips, and schools. These development projects were not neutral investments, but rather part of the colonial counterinsurgency toolkit, designed to bind the community to the state and distance them from neighboring groups that supported the insurgency.

Suspicion and reprisals reached a climax in the mid-1950s, when Mau Mau from Embu invaded Kanyuombora, killing the Mbeere for allegedly refusing to join the insurgency.12 These clashes highlight how colonial labelling entrenched Mbeere’s marginal position and set them against the Embu in a struggle over belonging and legitimacy.13

In postcolonial Kenya, the Mbeere faced collective victimization. They were left out of the Mau Mau nationalist story, portrayed as passive bystanders, rather than as participants in the struggle. The Mbeere loyalty, once instrumental to the colonial state’s agenda, became a reason for their political marginalization in the independent Kenyan nation. The paradox is telling: communities were either punished for “disloyalty,” as in the Somali case, or sidelined for “loyalty,” as in the Mbeere case. In both instances, belonging was conditional, not equal.

Neglect in Development

Marginalization in northern Kenya has never been only about security operations. Successive governments have treated the Northern Frontier District as an outlier, withholding key investments, including schools, hospitals, and roads. Garissa, Wajir, and Mandera, even in the 2000s, were among the poorest counties in Kenya.14 Their exclusion from the nation’s promise of development reinforced the message that citizenship is conditional and unequal.

This neglect was never accidental. It shows that colonial and postcolonial authorities used underdevelopment as a political weapon, a means of disciplining populations considered “untrustworthy” or “disloyal.” Roads and health centers were withheld, while development projects that did arrive often worked to sedentarize and control pastoralists rather than empower them.15

The Mbeere story provides a revealing parallel. During the Mau Mau Emergency period (1952-1960), colonial officials branded the Mbeere as “loyalists” and channeled selective development projects into their areas. Their collapse after independence left the Mbeere politically peripheral and economically sidelined.16

In both cases, citizenship was mediated through conditional development rather than equal rights.17 For Somalis, suspicion of disloyalty after the secessionist push gave rise to both repressive violence and coercive ‘development’ schemes.18 Systematic underinvestment turned neglect into a form of punishment. For the Mbeere people, selective investment tied their fate to colonial patronage, which proved unsustainable once the emergency ended.19 Both stories show how Kenya’s state, colonial and postcolonial alike, locked entire communities into loyalty-based development models that reinforced inequality instead of dismantling it.

The Politics of Symbolic Inclusion

Kenya’s presidents have long sought to balance systematic exclusion with gestures of inclusion to suit political needs. Under President Moi in the 1980s, Somali elites were drawn into the ruling party, KANU, to stabilize his government. In the aftermath of the 1982 attempted coup, Moi promoted Hussein Maalim Mohamed to Minister of State (1983) and appointed Mahmoud Mohamed as Chief of the General Staff (1985).20 A handful who occupied senior state or military posts and their influence largely reinforced the state’s bureaucratic machinery rather than dismantling the discriminatory structures that governed ordinary Somali lives.21

Successive governments continued the same pattern. Presidents Mwai Kibaki and Uhuru Kenyatta elevated Northeastern politicians into cabinet and high office, but the vetting regime and periodic “screening exercises” remained untouched. Inclusion was symbolic, useful for elite bargaining, but it left the deeper grievances of Somali citizens unresolved.

President Ruto’s 2025 decree fits this same historical pattern. With more than 600,000 registered Somali voters in Garissa, Wajir, and Mandera counties and many more in Nairobi, the timing suggests a bid to mobilize this bloc ahead of the 2027 election.22

Here too, the Mbeere case resonates. Their symbolic inclusion provided visibility but no real transformation. Irrigation schemes tied them to the colonial state without addressing structural marginalization. In both Somali and Mbeere cases, inclusion was largely symbolic rather than substantive, instrumental for elite bargains but ineffective in securing equal citizenship.

Beyond Vetting: Constitutional Promises and Historical Justice

Kenya’s 2010 Constitution already guarantees equal citizenship and prohibits ethnic discrimination. Article 12 affirms every citizen’s entitlement to identity documents, while Article 27 forbids discrimination based on ethnicity or region.23 Yet it has taken over fourteen years for these rights to be extended to Kenyan Somalis, a reminder of the gap between law and lived reality.

Proponents and defenders of vetting often point to insecurity, especially the threat of Al-Shabaab. However, history shows that the securitization of Somalis predates terrorism by decades. Now, as the government of Kenya digitizes its ID systems or rolls out a new digital ID, the risk is that historical biases could be coded into biometric registration, reproducing the very exclusions the new decree claims to end.24

Ending vetting is, therefore, a welcome correction. But it cannot stand alone. Without reforms, it risks becoming another symbolic gesture, like those offered in the past. True justice requires acknowledging historical atrocities, telling the truth, providing reparations, fostering reconciliation, and making serious investments in education, healthcare, and infrastructure in the northeast. This will help bring an end to long-standing marginalization and inequalities.

President Ruto’s decree should, therefore, be seen not as the end of a story of the marginalization and exclusion of Kenyan Somalis, but as the beginning of a more difficult conversation. Unless Kenya dismantles the entire architecture of suspicion built over a century, its Somali citizens will continue to experience citizenship as conditional—even if the paperwork is easier to obtain.

Endnotes.

  1. Minde, Nicodemus, and Wario, Halkano. “Kenya Ends Vetting for Northern ID Applicants,” Kujenga Amani, February 6, 2025, https://kujenga-amani.ssrc.org/2025/02/06/kenya-ends-vetting-for-northern-id-applicants/.
  2. Republic of Kenya. The Presidency. “Government Ends Extra Vetting for ID Registration in Border Counties.” February 5, 2025. https://www.president.go.ke/government-ends-extra-vetting-for-id-registration-in-borders-counties/.
  3. Human Rights Watch. Screening of Ethnic Somalis: The Cruel Consequences of Kenya’s Passbook System. September 5, 1990. Accessed August 16, 2025. https://www.hrw.org/report/1990/09/05/screening-ethnic-somalis/cruel-consequences-kenyas-passbook-system.
  4. Scharrer, Tabea. “Ambiguous Citizens”: Kenyan Somalis and the Question of Belonging.” Journal of Eastern African Studies 12, no. 3 (2018): 494–513. doi:10.1080/17531055.2018.1483864.
  5. The area was renamed Northern Province in 1925 and Northern Frontier Province in 1947. NFD is most commonly used when referring to the colonial era. See Mburu, Nene. Bandits on the Border: The Last Frontier in the Search for Somali Unity. Trenton, NJ: Red Sea Press, 2005, 47.
  6. Whittaker, Hannah. Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Kenya: A Social History of the Shifta Conflict, 1963-1968. Leiden: Brill, 2014, 25-29.
  7. Branch, Daniel. Kenya: Between Hope and Despair, 1963–2011. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011, 27.
  8. Ibid, 43
  9. Whittaker, Hannah. Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Kenya: A Social History of the Shifta Conflict, 1963-1968. Leiden: Brill, 14-15
  10. Branch, Daniel. Kenya: Between Hope and Despair, 1963–2011. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011, 27-33.
  11. Weitzberg, Keren. “Keeping People out of Camps: Biometric Technologies, Contested Sovereignty, and Border Practices within Humanitarian Spaces.” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 51, no. 14 (2025): 3590–3609. doi:10.1080/1369183X.2025.2513155.
  12. Kanyingi, Benson.  At the Periphery in Mau Mau Discourse: A Case of the Mbeere of Embu County, Kenya, 1952–2014 (PhD diss., Karatina University, 2022), 96–97
  13. Kanyingi, Benson,  Mwaruvie, John, and  Osamba, Joshia. “Interpreting Embu-Mbeere Politics through the Lens of Sibling Rivalry, 1906-2021.” Egerton Journal of Humanities, Social Sciences & Education 13 (2024): 92–109, https://eujournal.egerton.ac.ke/index.php/ejh/article/view/128
  14. See Jabane, Ibrahim.  Rural Development and Marginalization: The Drylands of Northern Kenya (Nairobi: Heinrich Böll Foundation, 2021), 125; Haider, Esther. Conflict Analysis of Northern Kenya. Brussels: European Institute of Peace, 2020, 23.
  15. Jabane, Ibrahim. Rural Development and Marginalization: The Drylands of Northern Kenya. Nairobi: Heinrich Böll Foundation, 2021, 125-127.
  16. Kanyingi, Benson, Mwaruvie, John, and Osamba, Joshua. “Interpreting Embu-Mbeere Politics through the Lens of Sibling Rivalry, 1906–2021.” Egerton Journal of Humanities, Social Sciences & Education 13 (2024): 92-109, https://eujournal.egerton.ac.ke/index.php/ejh/article/view/128
  17. See Whittaker, Hannah. Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Kenya…107-110; Kanyingi et al “Interpreting Embu-Mbeere Politics,” 100–103. Access to services and recognition as “loyal” citizens depended on compliance with villagization schemes, where development was offered as a reward for obedience rather than as an equal right.
  18. Whittaker, Hannah. Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Kenya: A Social History of the Shifta Conflict, c.1963–1968. Leiden: Brill, 2015, 107–12
  19.  Kanyingi, Benson.  At the Periphery in Mau Mau Discourse: A Case of the Mbeere of Embu County, Kenya, 1952–2014 (PhD diss., Karatina University, 2022), 211-219, 276 https://karuspace.karu.ac.ke/server/api/core/bitstreams/8e6f5246-51d9-489b-bf38-eb9cd0f18b98/content
  20. “The Kenyan State’s Fear of Somali Identity,” Conflict Trends, ACCORD (23 October 2015). https://www.accord.org.za/conflict-trends/the-kenyan-states-fear-of-somali-identity/
  21. Emma Lochery, “Rendering Difference Visible: The Kenyan State and Its Somali Citizens,” African Affairs 111, no. 445 (2012): 617.
  22. Etyang, Perpetua. “Ruto Ends ID Vetting for Northeastern Residents: The President Said the Move Will See Residents of Northern Kenya Acquire IDs with Ease,” The Star, February 5, 2025, https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2025-02-05-ruto-ends-id-vetting-for-northeastern-residents
  23. Constitution of Kenya, 2010, art. 12, art. 27, https://www.kenyalaw.org/kl/fileadmin/pdfdownloads/TheConstitutionOfKenya.pdf
  24. Kenya Human Rights Commission. The Forgotten Massacre: The Wagalla Massacre in Kenya. Nairobi: KHRC, 2014.