Nairobi, May 1 -- On a busy, chilly morning in Nairobi's central business district, a 37-year-old man stood quietly on the pavement, clutching a handwritten placard. It was not a protest in the conventional sense. Just a single, desperate message: he needed a job to provide for his family.

For years, Benson Kui has searched for employment. The search has yielded nothing.

"I studied at African Nazarene University from 2017 to 2023. I finished my studies," he says, carefully unfolding his certificates. He also trained at a college in Rongai, earning a diploma in hydroponics, skills he believed would secure him a stable future, but a future that never came.

"After school, I have never been employed. I have just been doing casual work," he...