In the run-up to the 1990 American presidential elections, incumbent George Bush uttered the now famous words, "It's the economy, stupid." Though the elder Bush never seemed to find the time to turn the economy around, losing the presidency hands down to Bill Clinton, there is no arguing that he had a point.

For years, the opposition has danced to the ruling party's tune, more often reacting to Kanu's agenda than setting its own. When not shuffling and stamping to Kanu's beat, opposition politicians are busy fighting each other or coming up with one reform movement or another.

Last Tuesday, the National Alliance for Change – which groups Mr Mwai Kibaki's Democratic Party with Mr Wamalwa Kijana's Ford-Kenya and Mrs Charity Ngilu's National Party of Kenya – announced its new blueprint for the future. The blueprint aims to create three million jobs in five years, provide free basic education, make the judiciary independent, establish institutional capacity to fight corruption and restore security for individuals and their property.

Whether there is anything new in the blueprint is still unclear, seeing that the actual programmes to achieve these goals are yet to be spelt out. What is important is that political groupings are shifting gear from mundane personality clashes to issues that affect Kenyans.

Nevertheless, one cannot help feeling that the proposals were crafted to please everybody. In education, for instance, the blueprint proposes to abolish the 8-4-4 system of education, which amounts to throwing out the baby with the bath water. It would be more cost effective and less socially disruptive were the 8-4-4 system to be improved instead of being discarded.

Apropos the Agricultural Finance Corporation (AFC), the alliancewants over Ksh5 billion's ($65 million) worth of loans to farmers be waived to pave the way for AFC to be converted into a bank.

Many of the AFC loans, dating back to the mid 1980s, were given to politically connected dairy and grain farmers with no appropriate appraisals done. Some of those loans were waived in the 1980s. The same opposition has been calling for a change of management at the corporation, accusing the current administration of wanton plunder, selective lending and failure to recover loans. One would expect the alliance to be pushing for better management of not only AFC but all parastatals to ensure that the public investments are justified and returns realised. Forgiving the loans runs counter to this, for it would encourage defaults in other sectors. 

Would an opposition government also forgive over Ksh20 billion ($265 million) owed to the National Bank of Kenya and the Kenya Commercial Bank, ostensibly due to business failure? Compensation for failed investments would need to be extended across the board, limiting the practicability of debt forgiveness.

Knowing that taxation is a politically sensitive issue, the alliance pledges to reduce corporation tax from 32.5 per cent to 25 per cent and cap Value Added Tax at 15 per cent. The logic appears to be that, to raise Kenya's GDP by a quarter to Ksh1,000 billion ($1.3 billion), the private sector needs more money to invest and households need more disposable income, so that spending will rise, stimulating demand and investment.

The tax cuts however appear populist when viewed against the subsidisation culture that the alliance proposes to revive in areas ranging from agricultural inputs, education and health to electricity and organic fuels. It is assumed that the lower tax rate would be offset by a wider tax base coupled with better revenue management. Bringing the informal sector into the tax net, key to the success of such a policy, may however prove more problematic than envisaged. 

In any case, why should energy be subsidised instead of encouraging investments in geothermal energy resources, which would make tariffs far more affordable? Is a production system based on subsidies and money market controls not likely to have the alliance at loggerheads with donors, whom it pledges to court?

However, these weaknesses in no way detract from the fact that the opposition has at last taken steps to revive debate on Kenya's economic crisis and the way forward.