The fundamentals of the Kenyan economy are strong

NAIROBI: Recent government cash flow hiccups at Treasury have raised questions about the stability of the Kenyan economy. The ensuing debate has been marked by a gross mischaracterisation of facts and confusion over the real nature of the macroeconomic challenges we face as a country. I will try to set the record straight in the hope of refocusing the discussion over how we should manage our economy back to the real issues.

First, we should be clear about the differences between the specific governance challenges we face and the overall stability of the economy. To this end, we should look at the trends in the data and ask questions such as: Are our debt levels sustainable? Do we have sufficient reserves at the Central Bank? Is the shilling an outlier in its performance against the dollar? And, since we live in a globalised world, how do we compare with our peers?