{"id":49925,"date":"2026-11-04T08:41:49","date_gmt":"2026-11-04T06:41:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=49925"},"modified":"2026-11-04T08:41:49","modified_gmt":"2026-11-04T06:41:49","slug":"world-bank-urges-kenya-to-curb-graft-raises-2026-growth-forecast","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/world-bank-urges-kenya-to-curb-graft-raises-2026-growth-forecast\/","title":{"rendered":"World Bank urges Kenya to curb graft, raises 2026 growth forecast"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>Kenya&#8217;s government should tackle corruption to boost economic growth and raise incomes, the World Bank said on Wednesday, as it raised \u200bits growth forecast for this year after a stronger than expected first half.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The \u200cEast African nation became a lower-middle-income country in 2014 under the Washington-based lender&#8217;s classification but has lagged its peers on widely used measures of governance.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;Governance challenges are increasingly limiting Kenya&#8217;s \u200bprospects for faster and more broadly shared growth, with corruption as \u200bthe key binding constraint,&#8221; the lender said in the latest edition \u2060of its biannual Kenya Economic Update report.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Corruption and collusion cost the country \u200ban estimated 2% of Gross Domestic Product a year through higher fiscal deficits, the World \u200bBank said.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;This translates into substantial additional borrowing needs accumulating over time,&#8221; it said in the report.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The International Monetary Fund said in June it had shared a draft report designed to flag \u200bgovernance weaknesses and corruption vulnerabilities with the Kenyan government, following a request \u200bfrom Nairobi to look into the issue.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The government is also rolling out an electronic procurement platform, \u200cwhich \u2060it says will cut graft avenues and wastage, and it has signed a conflict-of-interest bill.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Kenya has been struggling with heavy annual debt repayments in recent years after ramping up borrowing from 2013 to finance infrastructure.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>It has \u200balso been missing \u200bits fiscal deficit \u2060targets in recent years.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;Corruption risks contribute to a higher cost of borrowing,&#8221; the World Bank said in the report, citing \u200ba &#8220;governance premium&#8221; on sovereign borrowing.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The lender lifted Kenya&#8217;s economic growth \u200bforecast for \u2060this year to 4.6%, from an earlier forecast of 4.3%, citing faster-than-projected growth in the first six months of this year.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>It however warned of risks, including fiscal \u2060slippage \u200bthat could drive up debt. Kenya will also \u200bhold a general election in August next year, which could increase uncertainty, curb investment and tourism and \u200badd to spending pressures, the bank said.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":43173,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[44],"class_list":["post-49925","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-finance","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"","published_date":"","news_description":"'Kenya's government should tackle corruption to boost economic growth'","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/49925","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/49925\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49927,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/49925\/revisions\/49927"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43173"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49925"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=49925"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}