Treasury cash data fails to reveal a broke government

Treasury data indicate that the government’s financial position was better in March than in February despite the larger debt payments, contradicting public statements by officials portraying the government as broke.

President William Ruto, his Deputy Rigathi Gachagua and a host of top administration officials recently blamed delays in paying civil servants’ salaries in March on an acute cash crunch and loan repayments that they said required the government to pay creditors about Sh150 billion — about double the amount that’s usually paid.