Kenyan Protests, Part Three: Thoughts on potential pathways forward

The case for why Ruto should stop scheming and instead focus on a narrow set of achievable goals to restore the fiscal pact, improve service delivery, and boost growth

This is the third of a three part series on the current economic and political crises in Kenya. Part One addresses the political foundations of the crisis. Part Two will tackles the real economic challenges that the current administration inherited, and arguably made worse. Finally, Part Three concludes with some thoughts on the set of bad options on the table for the administration.

I: Three difficult options

There are no easy policy options out of Kenya’s fiscal crisis. There’s a decade-long “refinancing wall” ahead, with debt servicing already gobbling up about half of all revenues. Since access to and misappropriation of state resources is the glue that binds his political coalition, President William Ruto is unwilling to facilitate public finance management (PFM) reforms in the direction of better service delivery and less wastage/corruption. Talk of a national dialogue and the impending “unity” Cabinet that includes opposition politicians are tactics to buy time and political cov…