Why Kenya’s Economy is Stuck at 50 KPH

A couple of weeks ago, Nairobi’s drivers exploded into a tizzy over the enforcement of new speed limits on the city’s highways. The authorities, in all their enthusiastic wisdom, had decided to dust off dog-eared rulebooks, which would require any driver within a sniff of the capital city to stick to 50 kilometres per hour as they were making their way into town. It didn’t matter that you were on an international, eight-lane highway – the definition of city limits was such that you suddenly had to slow to a crawl on your way from Kampala to Mombasa, even when road conditions demanded a bit more prudence. The indignation was loud and sustained, with social media full of bluster and warnings, as drivers and car owners poured vitriol on the rules. Even lawyers weighed in, threatening legal action over the matter.

You may dismiss this as a mighty storm in a middle class teacup, or simply look at it as Kenyan officialdom being their ordinary, meddlesome selves. What it is, though, is a harbinger of the reason Kenya’s economy may never rise beyond one of petty traders and small-time dealmakers. It is an illustration of what happens when laws are designed and enforced arbitrarily, with no thought put on whether they reflect reality, and whether they’re solving the problem they purport to address.

The 50 kph speed limit makes sense in a built up, urban environment. Anyone speeding at 50 kilometres an hour down Kimathi Street is not only homicidally dangerous – they’re also inefficient drivers, because they will have to brake suddenly to accommodate the vagaries of a busy street. A highway such as Mombasa Road, Thika Road or Waiyaki Way is a different traffic environment, with vehicles trundling along in the same direction, and conditions (largely) making road users self-enforce a speed limit of around 80 kph or thereabouts. Someone driving down at 110 or 120 kph knows that they’re pushing their luck, and usually have little argument when flagged down for speeding.

The best and most effective laws – whether traffic-based or otherwise – are nudges. They reinforce good and predictable behaviour, and police and punish deviance. A good law should be almost invisible. If you do what is intuitively right, you should never even come close to law enforcers. If you do wrong, there’s nothing that should keep you from them.

The highway speed limit enforcement almost seems designed for failure. Sustaining that speed in a car calls for such concerted concentration, with nervous glances on the speedometer, that you may get into an accident simply because you did not notice other road conditions, or drifted into another lane. Some wags even posited that the limits were suddenly enforced in late August because there was a pressing need to raise school fees for third term.

So people will break this law. People will break other laws that are just as arbitrary, not because they have criminal intent, but because following such laws is the deviance, not the obeying of them. What it means is that the enforcement will begin to become arbitrary as well, with police arresting lawbreakers at random. Perceived power, favouritism and wealth comes into the picture. It becomes easy to solicit and give a bribe, when an otherwise upright citizen runs up against such capricious prosecution.

If you look around you, you will see the same in the business world. It may not be about the law as written, but the invisible rules and processes lead to the same outcome. On the one day, you need to see the Minister to get a go-ahead on your investment, on the other day you do not. On the one day, your restaurant conforms to all employment and public health statutes; on the next, some official waves an obscure edict in your face and threatens to shut you down. On the one day, you assume that you have paid all necessary fees to have your company logo on your delivery van; on the next, an officious City County official impounds it and tows it to the police station.

We end up in a situation where managers spend countless hours trying to untie the Gordian knots fastened by officials of all kinds, simply because business would simply grind to a halt otherwise. Astute businesspeople learn to keep the phone numbers of OCPDs, Governors and Senators on their mobiles, because to do otherwise would be to leave oneself at the mercy of junior officers whose concern is the size of the bribe they will receive.

We end up in a situation where size and success becomes an enemy, because putting one’s business head above the ramparts simply means that the shakedown becomes all the more lucrative for the officials. One then learns to hide success and camouflage true scale, if only in the effort to divert ravenous official attention.

The problem is that the aggregate is rarely seen. The traffic cop at the bottom of the food chain doesn’t see her effect on regional trade – only the 200-bob note proffered. The County officials only see the benefit of their bullying, not the limits they impose on an attempt by Nairobi to be a world-class city.

And the overall effect of this? In a world of autobahn-speed economies, Kenya’s economy ambles along at 50 kilometres an hour.

Also published in the Business Daily on September 9, 2014 at http://www.businessdailyafrica.com/Opinion-and-Analysis/Economy-ambles-along-at-50kph-due-to-arbitrary-law-enforcement/-/539548/2445742/-/mwi7pk/-/index.html