By Giyo Ndzi and Miriam Beatrice Wanjiru

“It is not tear gas. It is the fragrance of change” – This was the inscription on one of the placards paraded by young protesters in the Central Business District of Nairobi, Kenya, on June 25, 2025. In what has come to be known as Kenya’s Gen Z protests, the thousands of youth thronged the streets, refusing to be deterred by teargas and violent arrests. Their protest was an outburst of long-held grievances spanning taxation, police brutality and anger at corruption and bad governance. 

From the days of the Egyptian Bread Riots to the 2007-2008 Global Food price protests, the Arab Spring and before, food and by extension, social justice has been accountable for most protests. From Cameroon’s Anglophone teachers and lawyers’ protests to Nigeria’s #EndSARS, Nepal’s Gen-Z-led nationwide protests and Kenya’s recent Gen Z protests, the memories are as recent as they come. 

Kenya’s case was quite particular. While aspects such as the youth’s willingness to risk it all for accountability were at the fore, behind the scenes was another quiet revolution unfolding. It was the increased use of social media and digital tools for mobilisation. Chants from the streets were echoed by hashtags on the internet and livestreams. When the authorities attempted to barricade roads, the internet remained open. The Gen Zs wanted to be heard and there was no stopping them. Coming just weeks after a Kenyan court blocked internet shutdowns by telcos, it was a double victory for internet freedoms and Kenya’s youth. 

In the age of fast-evolving digital tools, civic engagement and expression of dissent has superseded physical gatherings and manifestations. Online platforms are used to mobilise for protests, plan marches, submit petitions, campaigns and even civil disobedience. Digital platforms offering encryption and safe messaging too are taking up their rightful place, providing safe passage for communication and plans by activists. And when authorities close the streets, the internet becomes the protest square. As expected, this paradigm shift comes with its own challenges, including content moderation across the internet, the use of digital surveillance, internet shutdowns to silence critics and run mis/disinformation campaigns and the rise of restrictive and vague cyber-laws (such as Kenya’s Computer Misuse and Cybercrimes Act, 2018), provisions that enable clampdowns on digital activists, journalists, and ordinary users with dissenting views. 

Take Cameroon. Many years after digital activism began reshaping civic spaces elsewhere, public protest at home remains rare, suffocated by fear, repression, and a narrowing civic space. And even ‘digital protests’ are frowned upon, with each clamped down harder than the last.  This accounts for one of many reasons why Paradigm Initiative’s latest Digital Rights and Inclusion Report Score Index places Cameroon four steps behind Kenya in continental rankings. Weak data protection legislation, failure by the government to proactively disclose and disseminate information digital technologies, and failure by the government to proactively disclose and disseminate information digital technologies are part of the mix. Add to these, a low rate of digital inclusion and the slow adoption of Artificial Intelligence and emerging technologies, and the gap widens further. Also, Cameroon is on record for one of the world’s longest internet shutdowns (93 days) and with citizens going to the polls on October 12, 2025, the international community like local organisations and activists are keeping sights on notably, the internet., and the digital space in general. 

But ranking above Cameroon on the Londa report’s Score index does not exonerate Kenya from its digital rights woes. If anything, it exudes more pressure for the East African leading nation to answer its name and do the needful. The 58-million man country has its own issues to grapple with, including internet shutdowns, false news criminalisation and arbitrary arrests and harassment of human rights defenders. The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR) documented 1,376 arbitrary arrests and 610 injuries over the last six months of 2024 alone, linking most cases to the June 2024 protests. 

When youth are praised but policed for speaking up

Across Kenya, Cameroon, and beyond, leaders have never shied away from emphasising the youth’s pivotal role in shaping the future. Kenya’s President, William Ruto during the August 12, 2025 International Youth Day celebration called them “The single most decisive force that will shape Kenya’s destiny…” Meanwhile, Cameroon’s longtime ruler, President Paul Biya, has repeatedly described youth as “Cameroon’s present and future,” urging them to persevere and build a strong nation.

But the irony is too glaring to miss. These same authorities and their governments who never lack praise for the youth, more often than not, find themselves on the side of force when it manifests in protests or even online campaigns. In July 2024, Junior Ngombe, a 23-year-old hairdresser and social media activist, was picked up outside his shop in Douala, Cameroon by plainclothes intelligence agents. He was subsequently detained in Yaoundé and charged with inciting rebellion through his TikTok posts, Human Rights Watch revealed. In May 2025, Kenyan software developer Rose Njeri Tunguru was arrested for creating a website that allowed citizens to email Members of Parliament about the proposed 2025 Finance Bill. She was detained for three days without formal charges, and her devices were confiscated.

Just two of multiple cases, Junior and Rose’s ordeals are a testament to the challenges youth continue to endure to assert their “force” and “destiny”. If anything, the youth have continued to prove that accountability in the digital age is not a mere concept, but a lived reality. Employing use of digital tools and digital spaces in their efforts, also testifies to why protecting digital rights should be non-negotiable.

Despite the diversity of their daily realities, the challenges of youth in Cameroon and Kenya stem from the need for more accountability from their leaders. Issues such as internet affordability, digital literacy gaps, online harassment, and shrinking civic space are largely consequences of authorities’ reluctance to ensure transparency and their desire to crack down on any dissenting voices. 

Youth, being youth, have proven time and again to stand for justice, regardless of whose ox is gored. Both countries continue to experience two sides of the same coin: the demonstration of the power of collective action and the price of standing up for social justice and accountability. 

Solutions and Policy Approaches

The lesson that threads through LONDA ‘24 is simple and urgent. As has been the case in Kenya, Nepal, Egypt, Cameroon, and elsewhere, youth are already doing the work of accountability, often at real personal cost. The question is whether states and companies will meet them with openness and safeguards, or with shutdowns, arrests, and opacity. A rights-respecting digital order is not an abstract ideal but rather a practical approach that can be implemented now. Keep the internet open. Keep the law clear. Keep participation affordable and meaningful. And keep power answerable to the very generation that will inherit it.

* Giyo Ndzi is Communications Officer at Paradigm Initiative

* Miriam Beatrice is Paradigm Initiative’s Programmes Officer for East Africa