Ruto blames the dollar shortage on cartels
Ruto blames the dollar shortage on cartels adding that his administration has put in place mitigation measures
Ruto blames the dollar shortage on cartels adding that his administration has put in place mitigation measures.
Speaking on March 22 at the listing of Laptrust Imara (REIT) at the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE), Ruto urged oil dealers to stop hoarding dollars going forward because the government will now be buying oil with Kenyan shillings.
“As a Government, we have made innovative intentions and undertaken an innovative strategy to ensure that we ease the burden of the availability of the Dollar in our market.
“We just concluded last week an arrangement in our fuel sector that will see Kenya access all our fuel needs in a differed six-month credit. That will eliminate a demand of $500 million dollars every month from this market,” the President revealed.
Ruto further exposed a clique of Kenyans who were hoarding dollars in an unethical quick money-making scheme causing shortage.
“Therefore, for the people who work numbers, I am giving you free advice that those who are hoarding dollars, you shortly might go into losses. You better do what you must do because this market is going to be different in a couple of weeks,” he warned.
“We have been having conversations with the Central Bank to reinstate the inter-bank exchange market that has since not worked and I am happy that the players in that sector are working with CBK so that we can again take charge of our market,” the President added.
Ruto explained that brokers will no longer distort the market after the reintroduction of the exchange market.
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“I am told the only place where brokers are accepted is at the NSE, anywhere else they are banned,” the President humorously remarked amongst cheers from NSE staff.
Ruto’s directive came a day after Energy Cabinet Secretary Davis Chirchir explained how a few individuals were holding the country at a ransom by hoarding dollars.
“We do not know the true value of the Shilling to the Dollar. The CBK publishes an exchange rate of Ksh125 but you go to the market and you buy at Ksh142.
“Even the dollars which are available in the country are not helping the situation. If I bought dollars today and I knew the value would go up in a few days, I am willing to withhold the dollars for speculative purposes,” Chirchir remarked on Tuesday, March 21 when addressing the dollar shortage in the country.
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