Kenya’s Ruto: Labour export to Germany is not brain drain; there’s enough where those come from

Kenya’s PresidentWilliam Rutoon Friday said a bilateral deal his country had signed with Germanywouldnoterodethe skills needed to help industrialise,but wasinstead an opportunity to addressyouthunemployment.

At a jointpress briefingwith German Chancellor Olaf Scholzin Berlin,DrRuto fought back criticismthatthe deal could lead to brain drain as masses of educated Kenyan youth target better jobs in Germany.

The deal known as Kenya-Germany Comprehensive Migration and Mobility Partnership Agreement (some German dispatches labelled itanMoU for a pilot project on job placementsis meant to “formalise the cooperation on migration and labour mobility between both countries.”

According to a brochure shared with the media on Friday, it isexpectedto provide a framework for cooperation and information exchange on labour mobility, apprenticeship, student training, labour market needs, employment and welfare of workers, readmission, and return.

But the merging questioniswhether it could lead to more educatedpeoplefleeing Kenya, leaving the country’s industrialisation targets in limbo.

“I want to assure you that we have skills, we have developed a huge human capital.As you may be aware, Kenya is a young country,”DrRutosaid.

“We have a huge young population that cannot only satisfy our industrialisation agenda in Kenyabutalso here in Germany. In fact, it will provide an avenue for us to tap the skills here,” he argued.

That agreement, he said, had been negotiatedinthepast year and focuses on all “skills sets” and wouldensure Kenyan training centres raise their standards to be at per with Germany’s,including twinning syllabi and training Kenyans in German.

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The deal is expected to provide opportunities for at least 250 professional, skilled and semi-skilled Kenyan nationals in fields such asinformation technologyand engineering, to work in Germany, helping the European country meet its needs in the necessary sectors and address an ageing workforce problem.

In Nairobi, however, that has to be balanced with some of the policies Ruto’s government pledged before he was elected.

They had promised to raise industrialisation to at least 15 percent of GDP, up fromsevenpercent.

Kenya traditionally has relied on agriculture and the service industry to sustain its economy, now expected to growat5.2 percent on average, according to the World Bank.

Yethealso promised to addressthehuge youth unemployment problem amid local scarcity ofjobs, which may mean hunting for opportunities abroad. For that, Ruto’s government has taken flak for exporting labour, someevensemi-skilled.

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In Germany, however, the deal addresses a different political problem:Illegal migration. Part of the deal will ensure illegal Kenyans in Germany are returned to Nairobi and Kenya will ensure they don’t sneak back.

Germany hasbeen one of the most accommodativeWestern Europeans to migrants but has struggled to tame the flow.

Some92,119 individuals illegally entered Germany between January and September of 2023, according to official figures.Others entered legally but overstayed.

Then there is a group that entered legally, then applied for asylum,which was denied,but then vanished into the country toavoiddeportation.

Officially, this deal is to provide a“win-win”model for solving Germany’s labour conundrum occasioned by the retirement of the“baby boomer generation”while offering decent remote jobs to restive,but qualified, young Kenyan professionals, according toadispatch.

“We are happy to export Kenyan expertise to support German industrialisation. There is also the opportunity that we can transfer some of your industries to Kenya so that we do not have to export the labour here,”PresidentRuto said.“This agreement gives us an opportunity to avoid illegal immigrants,because illegal immigrants give a problem to both Kenya and Germany.”

Chancellor Scholz, backing the deal, has had to convince local politicians to support it. At thejointpress conference, he said Germany needs skilled workers from Europe and many other places in the world, legally.

The country has taken insixmillion workers, a figure he said has saved Germany from “a very difficult situation” of an ageing workforce.

“Germany has the opportunity to evade that trapwhile benefiting both countries,” he said.

That will continue, he said, but Germany wants “a clear reduction of irregular migration and better border management…By using this openness we can use this agreement to return people when it becomes necessary.”