Skip to content
Subscriber Only
Markets

Kenyan Debt Remains Sustainable Despite IMF Warning, Rotich Says

  • Risk would only come from exceptional circumstances: Treasury
  • East African nation’s debt more than doubled in past six years
Buildings stand on the skyline in Mombasa, Kenya.

Buildings stand on the skyline in Mombasa, Kenya.

Photographer: Luis Tato/Bloomberg

Kenya’s borrowing remains manageable, its treasury secretary said, looking to quash concerns after the International Monetary Fund raised its assessment of the country’s risk of debt distress to moderate.

The East African nation’s nominal debt-to-gross domestic product is still sustainable at 55 percent, far lower than the IMF’s upper threshold of 74 percent, while the net value of the debt is less than half of GDP, Henry Rotich told a conference Sunday.