Kenyans Losing Faith in Broad-Based Government, Latest Survey Reveals

Public backing for the historic broad-based government has taken a significant hit, with a new national survey showing support falling sharply over the past six months. This indicates that the political honeymoon may be over for the alliance between President William Ruto and the late former Prime Minister Raila Odinga.

The latest findings from Tifa Research reveal that approval for the broad-based arrangement has tumbled from 44% in November 2025 to just 30% in May 2026, a 14-percentage-point decline that effectively wipes out the gains the coalition made throughout last year.

A Reversal of Hard-Won Momentum

The drop is particularly striking when viewed against the trajectory of public sentiment over the past year. In May 2025, only 22% of Kenyans supported the broad-based government. That figure climbed to 29% by August 2025, then surged to a high of 44% in November, suggesting the arrangement was gradually winning over a skeptical public. The latest data confirms that progress has now gone into reverse, with May 2026 support levels almost exactly mirroring those recorded in August 2025.

Opposition to the alliance tells the same story from the other direction. The share of Kenyans who oppose the Ruto-Odinga cooperation rose from 48% in November 2025 to 56% in May 2026, meaning a clear majority of the country now rejects the arrangement.

For context, opposition stood at 54% in May 2025, fell steadily as the alliance found its footing, and has now climbed back above that opening mark.

The percentage of respondents with no opinion also shifted, rising from 8% in November 2025 to 13% in May 2026. That uptick points to growing political disengagement among a segment of the Kenyan population, people who may once have held a view but are now less certain about where they stand.

What Is Driving the Decline?

Political analysts point to a familiar set of pressures. The high cost of living continues to squeeze Kenyan households, and many citizens feel the broad-based government has failed to deliver on the economic expectations that came with its formation. When a political arrangement sells itself partly on the promise of stability and national unity, public patience runs thin quickly if everyday life does not improve.

Doubts about how effectively the coalition addresses urgent national concerns like unemployment and food prices have likely accelerated the erosion of goodwill that the alliance built through much of 2025.

About the Survey

Tifa Research conducted the fieldwork for this study between May 2 and May 11, 2026, reaching 2,013 respondents through face-to-face household interviews. The team worked primarily in Swahili to ensure clear and accessible communication, supplementing with English where necessary to make certain that all participants fully understood the questions.

The nationally representative sample covered nine geographic zones: Central Rift, Coast, Lower Eastern, Mt Kenya, Nairobi, Northern, Nyanza, South Rift, and Western. The study carries a margin of error of plus or minus 2.18%, with the research team noting that larger margins apply to smaller sub-samples within the data.

With the 2027 election cycle beginning to take shape, the declining popularity of the broad-based government adds a new layer of political pressure on the Ruto administration and raises fresh questions about whether the alliance can recover the ground it has lost before Kenyans head back to the polls.

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