A procession of demonstrators carried white crosses with the names of those killed by police over the past year; others held up huge hearts or marched with flowers.
Unemployed truck driver Daniel Maina, 33, watched them pass: “Today, I am here to remember our fallen heroes,” he said.
As day turned to night, it became clear there would be new names to commemorate.
At least eight people were killed nationwide, according to the Independent Medico-Legal Unit, a leading association of medical professionals, including two deaths each in Machakos and Makueni, areas south of the capital. The circumstances of the deaths were not immediately clear.
The protests a year ago were sparked by a tax bill that would have hiked rates on basic foodstuffs while allowing what critics see as the Government’s self-dealing to continue.
Kenya’s legislators are among the highest paid in the world and enjoy lavish perks, while the country’s public schools and hospitals routinely struggle for funding.
Within an hour of the bill’s passage, the Parliament was in flames.
Some of those arrested that day turned up dead. Others were abducted by plainclothes security forces weeks or months later.
In the aftermath, there have been repeated showdowns between heavily armed police and young demonstrators demanding justice for the dead and missing.
During protests against police brutality last week, triggered by the death in custody of a blogger critical of police, a photographer from the Associated Press captured images of two officers shooting an unarmed vendor in the head at close range as he tried to flee.
Kenya is East Africa’s wealthiest nation, seen by Washington as a bulwark of stability in a deeply troubled region. Kenyan security forces serve as peacekeepers in United States-backed missions in Somalia and Haiti.
A joint statement today from the US Embassy and other Western diplomatic missions said that “protecting the right to protest is vital to preserving civic space and a cornerstone of Kenya’s vibrant democracy”.
The statement also said that “we are troubled by the use of hired ‘goons’ to infiltrate or disrupt peaceful gatherings”. It referred to armed gangs that appeared at protests last week, attacking demonstrators with wooden planks and looting shops as police officers looked on.
As the protest anniversary neared, Kenyan officials struck a note of defiance.
“Let me tell you some home truths you stupid young people,” David Ndii, an economic adviser to Kenyan President William Ruto, posted on X. “… My generation also had its heroic stupid young men. They were hanged. We learnt.”
A youth movement
On Wednesday morning local time, the protesters streamed into downtown Nairobi carrying vuvuzelas.
James Kariuki, a 24-year-old chef, was holding a bouquet of yellow roses in memory of his friend Boniface, who was killed by security forces last year.
“We are fighting for our rights. They will never send us home,” he said.
The protesters controlled the main thoroughfare of Kenyatta Avenue for most of the day. Some lit bonfires while others sped past on skates, the scene at times resembling a chaotic carnival.
Moh, 40, a doctor, said she was there for her patients.
“They cannot get services unless they have money,” Moh said. Like others interviewed, she spoke on the condition that she be identified by only her first name, for fear of government retaliation.
“Especially with the USAid cuts, people are really worried about HIV medication,” she said.
US President Donald Trump’s cuts to American foreign aid have upended the lives of Kenyan families battling HIV, leaving them to depend on a beleaguered national medical system.
A lawyer, Tess, 29, said Ruto has “no respect for the law, and without respect for the law, everything crumbles”.
“They are just stealing from us,” she said.
As afternoon approached, the crowd in Nairobi’s central business district swelled. Protesters carried placards and posters: “Scared of Youth? You have not seen anything yet,” one read.
“Real patriots ask questions,” another said.
Samuel, 24, said he was friends with Rex Masai, one of the first protesters shot during last year’s demonstrations. Samuel was back on the streets, he said, because “no one is safe”.
More than 60 protesters have been killed by security forces over the past year, according to rights groups, and over 1000 have been injured.
Dozens have been abducted by plainclothes agents, and at least 26 are still missing, according to the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights.
As protesters marched, they sang the national anthem and held up one finger, chanting “one term”, a now-common slogan among Ruto’s critics, who are demanding that he not seek re-election in 2027.
“I voted for Ruto the first time,” said Shadrack Kioko, 21, “but I am so disappointed, because he is killing our generation”.
The latest protests, like most previous ones, drew a heavy-handed police response.
In one instance, officers fired tear gas directly into a medical camp treating protesters.
As the police vehicle approached, a line of volunteers held up their hands in a cordon; one waved his fluorescent vest over his head, yelling “Medics!” just before the acrid smoke was unleashed.
One woman was hit in the mouth with a canister. Bleeding patients and medics stumbled away, retching.
Wala Amakove, a doctor who was co-ordinating the medics, said that by 6pm local time they had treated 500 wounded people.
Of those, she said, 83 needed hospital referrals for wounds from rubber bullets and live fire, direct hits by tear gas canisters and beatings.
“And we treated three officers,” she said. “Make sure you put that in, because they are the ones who attacked us.”
Some police whipped and beat protesters as they sat on the ground, witnesses said.
One woman bleeding heavily from the forehead said she was clubbed twice on the head, and her friend was also hit when she lifted an arm to defend her.
Kenyan police did not respond to a request for comment.
Kenyan authorities ordered television and radio stations to stop their live coverage of the protests, and the messaging app Telegram had been restricted, according to the monitoring group NetBlocks.
There were protests across the country as well, including in the coastal city of Mombasa and the lakeside town of Naivasha.
Waiting for justice
Some chose to stay home Wednesday.
Jedidah Ombura, 46, watched the protests on television from her home in Homa Bay, a town in western Kenya.
Her 23-year-old son, Denzel Onyango, an engineering student, was among the crowd that stormed the Parliament building on June 25 last year. Two weeks later, his body was found floating in an abandoned quarry.
“I am pacing, moving in the house. It’s too emotional for me. Today is just too emotional,” she said tearfully over the phone. “No one has ever called us to tell us the killers.”
A postmortem report found bruises and blood clots at the back of Onyango’s head. The pathologist told the family he had been hit with a blunt object.
“All we want is justice,” Ombura said.
