President William Ruto’s administration has formally endorsed the decision for Kenya to become a member of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), which is headed by China.
The AIIB is widely recognized as a competitor to the World Bank. While the idea of joining AIIB had been proposed in previous memoranda, its approval was ultimately confirmed during the meeting led by the Head of State.
Should Kenya ratify its membership, it will become the newest addition to the bank, aligning itself with 109 other nations already divided into two segments: 94 full members and 15 prospective members.
AIIB, which was founded in 2016, has endorsed 252 projects, disbursing Ksh8 trillion (USD50.47 billion) to date. With its headquarters situated in Beijing, China maintains a leading ownership stake of 26.61%, trailed by India at 7.6%, Russia at 6.01%, and Germany at 4.2%.