Category: Business Daily

When cargo traffic slowed through the Strait of Hormuz this year, the cost of feeding continents moved with it. The corridor carries roughly a third of the world’s urea and nitrogen-based fertilisers.

Within a week, urea prices in the Middle East climbed 19 percent. Across Africa, where food already absorbs about half of household spending, the arithmetic was brutal: urea prices doubled from $400 to $850 per tonne, triggering a sharp rise in food prices.

The resumption of fertiliser and fuel flows brings relief to strained global markets. However, relief is not resilience. This was the third major fertiliser shock in five years, following the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. The Horn of Africa absorbed the cost.

It is structural dependence that turns distant conflicts into domestic emergencies. African states do not need to invent their way out of this challenge. The technologies and platforms already exist. Locally produced organic fertilisers, biostimulants and green-ammonia pathways already exist and need to be scaled.

The core problem is failure to align financing, policy design and market structures, so farming is profitable enough for supply to reliably follow demand. Improving nutrient-use efficiency and embracing nature-based nutrient sourcing can raise smallholder productivity and profits while reducing costs. Profitability is one of the food system’s most powerful levers and one of the most underused.

The assets are here. North Africa holds roughly 78 percent of the world’s phosphate reserves, while African fertiliser production has grown by 146 percent since 2002.

We have also built platforms for pooled procurement, regional trade and local manufacturing through AfCFTA, the Africa Trade Exchange and the Africa Fertiliser and Soil Health Action Plan. What is missing is sustained investment to get fertiliser to smallholder farmers affordably and on time.

But the conversation needs to change. In many African soils, nitrogen and phosphorus are among the most important nutrients determining crop yields. Africa’s binding constraint is often nitrogen rather than phosphate.

Nitrogen production is tied to natural gas, the feedstock from which it is made. Africa is not short of gas. Nigeria, Algeria, Egypt, Mozambique, Tunisia, Senegal and others sit on the feedstock required to manufacture nitrogen at scale. Yet they largely do so in isolation, if at all.

Africa’s gas-producing nations need to come together around a shared continental nitrogen agenda: coordinated investment in production that prioritises African farmers, rather than focusing primarily on export markets. This could run alongside green-ammonia initiatives, building synthetic nitrogen capacity today, and cleaner pathways for tomorrow.

Resilience is not a choice between organic and synthetic, or between old and new. It is an integrated soil-health system where locally produced mineral and organic inputs are used efficiently – the balance the Africa Fertiliser and Soil Health Summit are working to strike.

To achieve resilience, governments must invest in local and regional production, strategic reserves, blending facilities, soil-health and extension services, and trade corridors that move inputs efficiently.

They must also move away from blanket subsidies in favour of targeted, digitally delivered support for smallholder farmers, most of whom are women.

The private sector should build manufacturing and blending capacity, fertiliser financing and insurance, and last-mile distribution networks. Aliko Dangote’s ambition to build the world’s largest urea platform through a $7 billion regional expansion is a sign of what African capital can do at scale. Development finance institutions can further de-risk and catalyse such investments.

An easing of the Gulf crisis is the moment to move Africa’s fertiliser agenda from emergency response to structural transformation: an affordable, climate-smart, regionally integrated and sovereign ecosystem.

The hardest time to build resilience is in shock. The best time is when markets are calm and the memory of disruption is fresh.

Africa cannot transform its food systems while hostage to global fertiliser, fuel and freight markets. This needs to be the shock we finally respond to meaningfully by building local and regional systems of our own.

Equity Bank has entered the fast-growing market for vehicles powered by liquefied petroleum gas, also known as autogas, with loans of up to Sh200,000 for motorists seeking to convert their units from petrol and diesel.

In a deal between the lender and Proto Energy, loan beneficiaries will have a 30-day grace repayment period for the loans, which have an interest rate of 16.6 percent.

Equity Bank’s entry signals the allure of a market where motorists have largely self-funded the conversion of their vehicles to autogas amid skyrocketing prices of petrol and diesel.

The deal comes as the cost of petrol and diesel has significantly increased, with a litre of either costing at least Sh14 more compared to a litre of autogas, pushing more motorists to seek cheaper alternatives.

A litre of diesel and petrol is now retailing at Sh217.86 and Sh214.03 in Nairobi, in a price rally that had seen prices hit a historic high of Sh242.92 per litre of diesel in May this year amid the global disruptions caused by the Middle East conflict.

Autogas is averaging Sh100 per litre in Nairobi, offering motorists, especially those in the ride-hailing and public transport sectors, cheaper fuel and an opportunity to lower operational costs.

‘Our partnership with Equity Bank addresses a critical barrier to LPG adoption by making financing more accessible. Whether it is a motorist converting to autogas or an institution transitioning, customers can now access financing alongside the technical expertise, infrastructure and reliable supply required to make that transition successful,’ Joel Kamau, the CEO of Proto Energy, said.

‘Through our partnership with Proto Energy, we are enabling motorists and institutions to access financing for LPG solutions while supporting the transition to cleaner and more efficient energy,’ Moses Nyabanda, the Managing Director of Equity Bank, said.

An estimated 20,000 vehicles had been converted to autogas by the end of 2024, with more expected due to the rising cost of petrol and diesel.

It costs an average of between Sh67,000 and Sh120,000 to retrofit a petrol or diesel engine to autogas, and vehicles can switch between autogas and diesel/petrol seamlessly, enhancing driving range and flexibility.

Regulatory filings indicate that nine firms increased or maintained dividends despite a fall in profits, while a further nine raised the shareholder payouts at a faster rate than earnings growth.

Absa Bank Kenya, Standard Chartered Bank Kenya (StanChart), BOC Kenya, Centum Investment Company and Kenya Power have raised dividends despite falling profits, while TPS Eastern Africa, CIC Insurance Group, Kenya Re and Liberty Kenya Holdings maintained payouts despite weaker earnings.

Analysts link the dividend payouts to pressure on management to reward investors, the maturity of some listed firms and fewer opportunities for aggressive expansion.

‘The general trend on the NSE over the past two years is that share prices have gone up, with investors moving away from fixed-income instruments and more into equities. There could be some pressure on management to ensure that they deliver returns commensurate with their share price,’ said Erick Musau, executive director for research and sustainable finance at Standard Investment Bank.

This points to companies placing greater emphasis on shareholder returns as they navigate weaker margins, subdued demand and high operating costs in corporate Kenya.

‘Dividend management also helps companies avoid shareholder discontent. If management fails to deliver value to shareholders, that is when they become vulnerable to removal. But when companies reward shareholders through dividends, they become less vulnerable to being replaced,’ said Mr Musau.

BOC Kenya is the latest to raise dividends faster than earnings, increasing its interim payout by 60 percent to Sh4 per share despite a 39.8 percent decline in net profit to Sh100.37 million for the half year ended June.

Absa and StanChart followed the trend, raising interim payouts despite lower half-year earnings.

Absa increased its dividend per share by 150 percent to Sh0.50 from Sh0.20 despite a 9.8 percent decline in net profit to Sh10.53 billion.

StanChart raised its interim payout by 6.3 percent to Sh8.50 despite a 16.8 percent decline in net earnings.

Absa Kenya, which is majority-owned by South Africa’s Absa Group, said it had adequate capital to support loan book and deposit growth without breaching regulatory capital requirements.

‘We have done what we call stress tests on our business, and we are comfortable with our capital levels. So with that, we say we can distribute more earnings. It is not that we are not ready for business. We are, and actually our book has picked up so much,’ said Yusuf Omari, interim CEO at Absa Kenya.

Mr Musau said firms with multinationals as anchor shareholders such as StanChart, BAT Kenya and East African Breweries PLC (EABL) also have an incentive to pay dividends because they provide a key avenue for the top owners to extract returns.

‘For many multinationals, the only way to get money out of the business is by declaring a dividend and, for that matter, as high as possible,’ he said.

The decisions suggest that dividend policy is increasingly being influenced by factors beyond the latest annual earnings figure, including companies’ desire to maintain a record of shareholder returns and confidence that weaker earnings may be temporary.

Read: NSE firms start paying juicy Sh75bn dividends

TotalEnergies Marketing Kenya increased its dividend 79.7 percent to Sh3.45 per share after profit rose 45.6 percent, while BAT Kenya raised its full-year dividend by 40 percent to Sh70 after profit increased 17.1 percent. EABL lifted its dividend by 59 percent to Sh12.70 after net profit rose 49.4 percent.

Kapchorua Tea increased its dividend per share to Sh30 from Sh25 after net profit rose 8.7 percent to Sh196.9 million in the year ended March 2026, taking the total payout to Sh469.4 million.

Williamson Tea returned to a net profit of Sh120.8 million from a Sh166.4 million loss and raised its dividend to Sh15 from Sh10, resulting in a total payout of Sh525.3 million.

Centum increased its dividend 2.5 times to Sh0.78, comprising Sh0.42 ordinary and Sh0.36 special payout, despite an 8.5 percent decline in net profit to Sh743.9 million for the year ended March 2026.

Mr Musau said firms such as Centum now have more room to increase dividends at a faster pace than profits as they emerge from a period of highly leveraged balance sheets. Centum completed a multi-year balance sheet restructuring that left the company debt-free.

‘Firms such as Centum have paid down a lot of their debts now. They are seeing they want to reward the shareholders after a period of drought,’ said Mr Musau.

Banks have added to the trend, with many growing dividends at a faster pace than their profits.

NCBA raised its full-year 2025 dividend by 29.1 percent to Sh7.10 per share, against seven percent profit growth to Sh23.4 billion. Its 2026 interim dividend rose 50 percent to Sh3.75 as first-half profit increased 12.2 percent.

KCB increased its dividend per share by 133 percent to Sh7 in 2025, partly reflecting the sale of National Bank of Kenya, against 11 percent profit growth to Sh68.4 billion. Its interim dividend rose 50 percent to Sh3 in the half year after profit grew 14.2 percent.

DTB and Co-operative Bank also raised dividends faster than profits in 2025, with payouts rising 28.6 percent and 66.7 percent against profit growth of 23 percent and 16.9 percent, respectively.

Other companies have opted to protect rather than increase dividends amid a decline in profits. For instance, TPS Eastern Africa, the operator of Serena Hotel, maintained its Sh0.35 payout despite a 40.2 percent profit decline to Sh787.2 million.

CIC Insurance held its dividend at Sh0.13 despite an 82 percent earnings collapse to Sh513.8 million, while Kenya Re maintained Sh0.15 after profit fell 11.6 percent to Sh3.92 billion. Liberty Kenya also retained its Sh0.50 payout despite a 65.3 percent profit decline to Sh487 million.

Then the internet transformed travel, with visitors turning to search engines, online booking platforms and social media to discover destinations, compare experiences and make decisions.

Today, we are entering another major shift, Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly becoming part of the traveller’s decision-making process.

Rather than searching through dozens of websites, travellers can simply ask an AI tool where they should go, what they should experience and how they should plan their journey. Technology is moving from helping travellers find information to actively influencing the choices they make.

This shift is also changing how the tourism industry operates, according to PwC’s AI at the Heart of Tourism and Hospitality – Powering Personalisation, Efficiency and Growth report, tourism and hospitality leaders have moved beyond exploring AI and are now piloting practical applications, signalling a decisive shift from experimentation to implementation.

In Saudi Arabia for instance, AI is central to its Vision 2030, supporting the country’s ambition of welcoming 150 million annual visitors and increasing tourism’s contribution to GDP from three percent to 10 percent.

Consumer behaviour is evolving just as rapidly, according to the 2026 AI in Travel and Tourism CareerTrainer Report, 62 percent of travellers now use AI-enabled tools, 58 percent say AI recommendations improve trip planning, while 73 percent expect personalised travel experiences based on their data.

The report also found that 94 percent of tourism and hospitality leaders across the region are already experimenting with or implementing AI solutions, highlighting how quickly the technology is becoming mainstream.

Additionally, according to Adobe’s Digital Data Index and Marriott Bonvoy’s Ticket to Travel report, AI referrals to travel sites surged by 194 percent year-on-year in 2026, while almost half of travellers worldwide now use generative AI tools to plan trips, up sharply from 22 per cent just three years earlier.

This shift has profound implications for tourism; the question is no longer simply whether a destination can be found online. It is whether it is visible, relevant and compelling enough to be recommended by the technologies increasingly shaping how travellers discover the world.

In 2025, Kenya welcomed 7.9 million tourists, comprising 2.7 million international visitors and 5.2 million domestic travellers, generating close to Sh500 billion in earnings. International arrivals grew by 9 percent, more than double the global average growth rate of 4 percent recorded that year.

These figures show that the current model, built on strong marketing, visa reforms and improved connectivity, is working. The question now is whether that momentum can be sustained and accelerated by a stronger digital foundation.

Regional destinations such as Morocco, Rwanda, Egypt and South Africa are investing heavily in smart tourism systems. Rwanda’s digital travel platforms have streamlined border processes, while Egypt’s Grand Egyptian Museum uses digital quotas and AI tracking to manage crowds.

Digital transformation is not simply a modest upgrade, it is a structural shift requiring destinations to re-engineer how they gather data, understand visitor behaviour, manage natural assets and market themselves with precision.

Kenya has already taken important steps, the electronic travel authorisation simplified entry at a policy level, while the partnerships provide tools to study visitor flows, seasonal peaks and regional spending patterns through analytics.

The harder task is extending digital capability beyond large hotels, airlines and tour operators to community conservancies, small lodges, cultural centres and independent guides who shape much of the visitor experience.

If digital transformation only strengthens businesses with capital and technical capacity, it risks widening the gap between large tourism enterprises and the small businesses that sustain rural and coastal economies.

AI can help Kenya market its wildlife corridors, beaches and cultural sites to travellers most likely to value them, easing pressure on fragile ecosystems while raising visitor value. Digital payments, smarter mobility and data analytics can further smooth the journey and help manage seasonal peaks in the destination’s attractions

These questions will form part of the conversation at the Magical Kenya Travel Expo in Nairobi this October, where governments, technology innovators, investors and the travel trade will examine how digital tools can serve sustainable tourism growth.

Technology, however advanced, can only go so far, warmth, genuine hospitality and the expertise of a guide interpreting a landscape remains uniquely human.

June Chepkemei is the CEO, Kenya Tourism Board

What kind of economy can Kenya build when an ever-growing share of public resources is committed to servicing yesterday’s borrowing? Public debt had reached Sh12.86 trillion by April this year, equivalent to 69.4 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), according to Treasury.

The more important question is not simply how much Kenya owes, but what the country is getting for the debt. Borrowing to finance productive infrastructure can generate growth and revenue.

However, borrowing increasingly to refinance existing obligations creates a vicious circle – borrow to repay, tax to borrow and borrow again to service the debt. Debt then becomes a mechanism for postponing rather than solving the fiscal problem.

The imbalance between debt service and development expenditure makes this worrying. When debt repayment absorbs resources that could finance infrastructure, agriculture, healthcare, education and industrialisation, the government sacrifices the investments required to expand the economy.

The issue is, therefore, not debt alone, but whether Kenya is borrowing to transform its productive capacity or simply taking loans to maintain an existing debt structure.

This is where the views of leading economists become relevant. Joseph Stiglitz has argued for stronger mechanisms for sovereign debt restructuring, warning that delayed resolution can deepen socio-economic costs.

Carmen Reinhart’s extensive research on sovereign debt crises demonstrates that restructuring and debt relief can be important components of recovery from debt overhang.

Olivier Blanchard, meanwhile, emphasises that debt sustainability depends not merely on the debt-to-GDP ratio but also on the relationship between economic growth, interest rates and the capacity of the government to stabilise debt.

Kenya should, therefore, begin a serious conversation about orderly sovereign debt restructuring. Note that restructuring is not synonymous with reckless default. It is a negotiated adjustment of maturities, interest rates and repayment schedules designed to restore sustainability and create fiscal space.

The objective is not to escape responsibility for debt, but to prevent repayment from destroying the capacity of the economy to grow.

Barbados provides an important precedent.

Under Prime Minister Mia Mottley, the Caribbean island nation undertook a comprehensive debt restructuring in 2018. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) found that the restructuring substantially reduced debt and financing pressures.

The lesson is not that Kenya should emulate Barbados, but that restructuring can be used as a policy instrument to restore fiscal space when the existing debt structure becomes untenable.

Ghana provides a more recent African example. It completed its domestic debt exchange in 2023 and its Eurobond restructuring the following year, while continuing negotiations with official creditors.

By 2025, the IMF reported significant progress in Ghana’s debt restructuring and improvements in investor confidence. Accra demonstrates that restructuring can be embedded within a broader programme of fiscal consolidation, financial-sector protection and economic recovery.

Ethiopia offers another important African case, though its restructuring is still evolving. After defaulting on its S$1 billion Eurobond in 2023, Ethiopia negotiated with official and private creditors under the G20 Common Framework.

This month, official creditors approved a preliminary agreement with private investors to restructure the Eurobond, bringing Ethiopia closer to emerging from default.

The Ethiopian experience also illustrates that restructuring can be lengthy and politically difficult, particularly where creditors have different interests.

Sri Lanka provides the cautionary lesson. Its 2022 default followed a severe fiscal and balance-of-payments crisis, forcing a comprehensive restructuring of external and domestic obligations.

According to the IMF, external creditors forgave about $3 billion and restructured another $25 billion, while the country subsequently regained access to international bond indices.

The lesson for Kenya is not that default is desirable, but that allowing an unsustainable debt burden to persist can ultimately make adjustment far more painful.

Kenya must, nevertheless, proceed carefully. Banks, pension funds, insurance companies and individual investors hold substantial government securities. A disorderly restructuring could destabilise the financial system and transfer the sovereign crisis into banks and pension funds.

Any restructuring must, therefore, be negotiated, credible and carefully designed to distribute the burden while protecting financial stability.

The fundamental principle should be simple – Kenya should not borrow merely to repay yesterday’s borrowing. Debt should finance assets that increase productivity, employment, exports and future government revenues.

The choice is increasingly between perpetual refinancing – borrowing more, taxing more and sacrificing development – or restructuring the debt burden and using the resulting fiscal space to rebuild productive capacity.

Kenya does not need to restructure its future; it needs to restructure the debt that is preventing it from financing that future.

The High Court upheld SBM’s right to enforce its security over The Alma in Ruaka, owned by Cytonn High Yield Solutions. This investment vehicle raised billions from investors for real-estate projects through special-purpose entities.

The court also protected buyers who will prove they had fully paid for their apartments before the bank registered its charge in August 2019.

The project sits on 4.67 acres of land, comprising nine blocks and 477 one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments. The project includes a commercial centre, swimming pool, gym, nursery, elevated playgrounds and more than 300 parking spaces.

The court’s ruling dealt a setback to more than 25,000 investors of the company and 110 homeowners who sought to join the liquidation case or stop the bank’s recovery efforts.

The legal dispute, currently ongoing at the Commercial Court in Nairobi, is part of Cytonn High Yield Solutions’ collapse, which was placed under liquidation in January 2023 after its administration failed to produce a rescue plan.

The Court of Appeal upheld the liquidation in November 2025, allowing the Official Receiver to preserve and realise assets linked to Cytonn High Yield Solutions for the benefit of creditors.

The Alma, valued at about Sh1.43 billion, was among the Cytonn properties preserved for the liquidation process. Others include Kilimani valued at Sh1.73 billion, Amara Ridge at Sh502.8 million, Superior Homes at Sh383.9 million, RiverRun at Sh535.9 million, Ridge, Athi River, CySuites, Taraji Heights, Applewood Miotoni and Mystic Plains/Newtown.

The court had said the properties were linked to funds invested by creditors, whose claims exceeded Sh11 billion, and ordered them preserved while the liquidation proceeded.

In the latest ruling, the High Court ruled that buyers who fully paid for their units before August 23, 2019, can have those apartments excluded from the property available for sale in the liquidation process.

‘I therefore hold that any homeowner who has proved full payment of the purchase price to the developer before August 23, 2019, to the required standard and places that evidence before SBM is entitled to have that unit excluded from the pool available for sale,’ the court said.

But buyers who purchased after the charge was registered face a different position. The court said the bank’s charge was then a public record, and buyers were required to conduct reasonable checks before paying the developer.

‘A purchaser who transacted after August 23, 2019 was buying land that was, by then, a matter of public record encumbered by a registered charge,’ the court said.

It stated that a buyer who failed to search the Lands Registry could not claim protection as an innocent purchaser. Units bought after the charge therefore remain available to SBM for sale to recover the outstanding debt.

‘These units purchased after August 23, 2019 remain available to SBM for sale in the exercise of its statutory power, to recover the sums outstanding under the defaulted facility.’

The ruling was a setback for Paul Opiyo, who sought to join the proceedings on behalf of 25,000 Cytonn High Yield Fund investors. The investors were said to have invested more than Sh300 million in developments affected by the preservation orders.

The court dismissed the joinder application after finding that the same question was already before the Court of Appeal.

Homeowners also failed to obtain protection because they did not prove that they had paid for their apartments. The court said sale agreements alone were insufficient evidence of payment. It held that a signed agreement alone could not establish their claim to a unit.

‘Where a homeowner produces a sale agreement, evidence of payments due under it including bank statements or receipts reflecting payment of the purchase price, that burden is, in my view, discharged,’ the court said.

It also dismissed applications by 121 homeowners and several individual buyers. Meanwhile, Cytonn Integrated Project LLP failed to overturn a consent between SBM Bank and the Official Receiver that gave effect to the lender’s secured recovery rights over The Alma, with the High Court adopting the agreement as a court order in November 2023.

The court held that the liquidator was entitled to enter the arrangement for creditors.

The insolvency process is still ongoing, with the Official Receiver pursuing creditors’ claims and the recovery of assets.

Financing land restoration and drought resilience took centre stage on Monday as ministers, development partners, investors, businesses and civil society gathered at the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) COP17 for Finance Day.

The discussions produced $1.3 billion in new and pipeline finance for land restoration and drought resilience across 23 countries. Of this, $644.5 million is new finance, with $216.4 million already confirmed and moving towards implementation.

For Africa, participants stressed that closing the financing gap must also mean changing how restoration investments are designed and who can access them.

She is also one of 35 experts on the UNCCD Science-Policy Interface, which is providing technological advice to the convention. Dr Chomba said women should be considered in the design of new financing mechanisms.

‘For restoration to be effective and inclusive, women must be beneficiaries of finance and have a voice in how investments are designed and implemented,’ she said.

The discussions also placed rangelands at the centre of the new investment push. The Rangelands Flagship Initiative, valued at $1.2 billion across 45 projects, was launched in Ulaanbaatar during the UN International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists in 2026. It is the largest single mobilisation for rangelands in the history of the UNCCD.

Rangelands cover more than half of the world’s land surface and support around two billion people. Yet up to half of these ecosystems are degraded or at risk. Rangelands generate estimated gains of $21 trillion to $47 trillion annually. Restoration returns $4 to $6 for every dollar invested, with returns reaching as high as $36 when wider public benefits are included.

For Kenya, the financing debate comes as the country confronts drought, degraded rangelands and declining land productivity.

Environment CS Deborah Barasa said restoration must be treated as an economic and development priority.

‘The challenge is no longer how to restore our landscapes. It is how to finance restoration at scale and sustain those investments for decades. We must use public finance to unlock private capital and make restoration a long-term investment in climate resilience, natural capital and sustainable development,’ she said.

The minister pointed to the Kenya Watershed Services Improvement Project as an effort to move from fragmented interventions towards a coordinated restoration.

The project combines policy reform, institutional strengthening, sustainable financing, watershed restoration, biodiversity conservation, livelihoods and digital monitoring.

The new commitments come as development banks and climate funds seek to make land restoration attractive to investors.

A dialogue involving the World Bank, African Development Bank, Asian Development Bank, European Investment Bank, Islamic Development Bank, the Global Environment Facility and Green Climate Fund highlighted the need for guarantees, first-loss capital, index-based insurance and project preparation facilities.

COP17 President Batmunkh Battsetseg, who is also Mongolia’s Foreign Affairs Minister said: ‘Effective restoration of land must be grounded in the knowledge and experience of local communities and indigenous people.’

As Finance Day closed, the message was that success of the commitments would be measured by whether the money reaches the people and landscapes that need it.

The State alleged that the emergency shipment was overpriced, of substandard quality, and procured at rates significantly higher than those agreed under existing deals.

A confidential letter shows that the owners of MT Paloma, the ship carrying the fuel, arrived at the outer limits of the port of Mombasa on March 27 at 2:30am and requested clearance to enter the port’s precincts. It was denied entry as answers were sought from top officials on why they allowed importation of fuel outside the government-to-government arrangement inked with top Middle East firms.

Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) was under clear instructions not to allow MT Paloma to dock at the port and discharge its cargo at Kipevu.

This prompted the owners of MT Paloma to fire a terse legal warning to KPA, warning the State agency that it will be held directly responsible for the Sh11.8 billion cargo, documents tabled in the Senate following a probe on the condemned fuel show.

‘This is to inform you that we must hold you responsible for the following facts and all consequences arising thereof. Customs clearance was requested at the time of tendering notice of readiness at 02;30 hours local time on March 27, 2026,’ says the letter fired to KPA and signed by Captain Cosmin Sarla on behalf of MT Paloma.

‘Customary or not and through no fault of my vessel or her owners or her agents or her agents, customs clearance has not been granted promptly on arrival at the time of my tendering of notice of readiness.’

The vessel warned KRA it will escalate its protest letter to a multi-billion shilling legal battle.

‘On behalf of my principals, we reserve the right to extend or modify this protest at a future time and place,’ said the protest note seen by the Business Daily.

The ship was allowed to dock following high-level discussions that involved top civil servants, sources familiar with the matter said.

It docked at berth No.1 at the Kipevu Oil Terminal 11 (KOT 11) on March 27 at 8:42pm, revealing a 12-hour delay in response to the high-stakes fight in the high seas.

Upon arrival within the outer limits of the port of Mombasa, ships are issued with customs clearance and permission for their crew to discharge cargo at the port, in what is technically referred to as free pratique in the shipping industry.

Free pratique is official permission given by a port health authority for a ship, aircraft, or vehicle to enter a port, disembark people, and load or unload cargo after certifying it is free of contagious diseases.

Without it, a vessel faces quarantine restrictions.

MT Paloma completed discharging the 60,200.813 metric tonnes of petrol on March 30, 2026 at 12.12pm.

This triggered a series of coordinated police raids targeting the highest echelons of Kenya’s energy sector.

By dawn of April 3, three of the most powerful men in the country’s energy sector were in police custody as detectives raced to unravel what the officials termed the worst white-collar crime in the petroleum market.

They all subsequently resigned on April 4.

The three, including former Principal Secretary for Petroleum Mohamed Liban, former Kenya Pipeline Company (KPC) CEO Joe Sang and former director-general of the Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (Epra) Daniel Kiptoo, were released on cash bail after spending days in the police cells.

The government said the three were at the heart of a scheme that manipulated data used to justify the emergency importation of fuel, despite standing contracts with Saudi Aramco Trading Fujairah, Abu Dhabi’s ADNOC Global Trading Ltd, and Emirates National Oil Company Singapore Ltd., arguing that the firms were all ?meeting their contractual obligations.

Parliament has issued a 60-day ultimatum to the investigators to submit a report on the outcome of the probe of the three senior officials in the energy sector arrested in April.

At the time, a vessel carrying 85,000 metric tonnes of petrol belonging to Gulf Energies got stuck at the port of Jebel Ali in the wake of Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

One Petroleum and Oryx Energies were on March 25 awarded the contracts to ship in 81.3 million litres each of petrol in deals that would later trigger the fall-out and the resignations and arrests of the three top officials in the country’s energy sector.

Hass Petroleum and E3 Energy also placed tenders for the emergency stocks.

Importation of the emergency cargo was sanctioned by NSCC on March 9.

One Petroleum said that it secured the vessel within three days of the award of the deal from BP International, one of its trading partners. The cargo was originally destined for Angola.

But the consignment did not meet the Kenyan specifications on the oxygenate, manganese, Sulphur and benzene content in petrol, prompting One Petroleum to seek a waiver from the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum.

On April 4, Head of Public Service Felix Koskei said that data on fuel stocks had been falsified to trigger importation of emergency stocks, days after MT Paloma discharged the fuel into the network of KPC.

The State then directed One Petroleum to recall the product, a move that industry executives said was not feasible given that it had already been discharged into KPC’s system and mixed with other stocks.

One Petroleum said that it had not initiated litigation against the State for the botched deal despite incurring losses running into millions of dollars.

But Oryx threatened to sue, saying that the State breached contractual agreements, exposing it to significant financial losses and reputational damage.

Oryx wrote to the government on April 9, notifying it of the need to take the consignment as agreed failing which this would translate to a contractual breach and trigger lawsuits.

‘The company reserves all rights arising from the cancellation while remaining willing to engage constructively with the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum,’ Oryx said in documents tabled before the Senate.

Yet even as urbanisation drastically changes the landscape, it has refused to entirely shed the customs that predate the construction boom.

Along roads leading in sit small shops, hardware stores and rental houses. Further inside, newly built apartments and gated communities are emerging among older family homes and open stretches of land.

Students rent modest rooms while families buy four-bedroom houses priced tens of millions of shillings. Developers are putting up apartments as sellers divide former expanses of land into smaller plots.

‘Here, when we talk about gated communities, most of those units will have at least four bedrooms,’ says Linda Mokeira, chief executive of real estate agency Jalisa Limited.

For families seeking more space, developers chasing demand and students looking for cheap accommodation, Ole Kasasi has become an increasingly attractive destination.

Much of this transformation has happened in little more than two decades. For long-time residents and land sellers, however, the history of Ole Kasasi stretches much further back, to a time when the area was largely pastoral land known as Erangau, or Rangau, and the idea of a busy property market was still far off.

Today, the neighbourhood is drawing buyers who want the space and relative tranquillity that have become increasingly difficult to find in the capital.

One of the easiest ways into Ole Kasasi is from the Maasai Lodge stage, where tuk-tuks and taxis ferry residents and visitors into the neighbourhood.

About three kilometres in stands the Ole Kasasi Police Station, one of the area’s best-known landmarks. Around it, small shops, eateries, hardware stores and rental houses line the roads, reflecting the commercial activity that has accompanied the population increase.

For Teketi Kimunyak, a long-time land seller, the story of Ole Kasasi begins with one family and a large tract of land. ‘Originally, Ole Kasasi is tied to the person who owned a major part of the area, almost 1,000 acres,’ he says.

The land was eventually subdivided and sold, bringing in more settlers and gradually changing the character of the area.

In its early years, Ole Kasasi was largely residential and pastoral. The Maasai were the dominant community and commercial activity was limited.

‘People started settling because the place was peaceful, with a lot of fresh air,’ Mr Kimunyak says. ‘At that time most of the people were the Maasai and it was not yet a commercial place until the early 2000s.’

‘Gradually, the place started developing into a town with amenities like African Nazarene University, hospitals, and commercial developments. Rongai also started developing toward Ole Kasasi and the interior part of Kajiado East,’ he says.

Cheap land turns prime property

The transformation is perhaps most visible in land prices. Mr Kimunyak remembers when an acre could be bought for only a few hundred thousand shillings.

‘The land prices are increasing every day, because about 15 years ago you could find an acre for even Sh300,000 to Sh500,000,’ he says.

Today, the figures are measured in millions.

Ms Mokeira says an acre in prime sections can fetch as much as Sh30 million. ‘As you go into the interior, an acre will cost Sh16 million to Sh20 million,’ she says.

Ms Mokeira says an eighth of an acre of land aound Nazarene University all the way down to the Maasai Lodge can cost Sh3.5 million to Sh5 million.

The sharp rise reflects a fundamental change in what buyers are looking for. Ms Mokeira points out that Ole Kasasi offers something increasingly scarce in Nairobi: room to build a standalone home, maintain a compound and still remain within reach of the city.

‘Families want standalone houses, a compound, greenery and a quieter environment,’ she says.

Eager to capitalise on the market demand that is also driven by Kenyans living in the diaspora looking for property investments, developers are increasingly putting up gated communities and multi-unit developments, particularly around the university.

Ms Mokeira says the profile of the prospecive Ole Kasasi property buyer is a Nairobi residents who want to move away from congested neighborhoods without going too far from the capital, as well as.

‘They want to be in a developed area, but without being in squeezed spaces,’ Ms Mokeira says.

A market of two worlds

The university has added another layer to the property market. Student demand has supported the growth of hostels, bedsitters and smaller apartments, creating a steady rental market alongside the more expensive family housing.

The result is a neighbourhood where two very different property markets exist side by side.

A modern four-bedroom house in a gated community can sell for between Sh25 million and Sh35 million, Ms Mokeira says, while standalone homes can reach Sh50 million depending on the size of the compound and quality of construction.

And rents have risen alongside property values.

A one-bedroom unit can rent for between Sh10,000 and Sh25,000 a month, while modern two-bedroom units can exceed Sh35,000. Three-bedroom houses go for around Sh50,000, according to Ms Mokeira.

In gated communities, rents can reach Sh75,000 a month, with some landlords asking as much as Sh100,000 depending on the size of the house, finishes and amenities.

The construction boom has brought shops, hardware stores and other businesses, but it has also exposed gaps in infrastructure and planning.

‘There is a challenge with infrastructure and the sewer system; there is also no proper zoning,’ Ms Mokeira says. ‘You cannot easily say that this is a high rise zone, this is a maisonette zone, etc.’

For homeowners, the absence of clearly defined development patterns can create uncertainty about what may eventually be built next door and how new developments could affect the character and value of existing properties.

Water is another concern, with many residents relying on boreholes to supplement supply.

Yet the rapid construction has also created a local economy of its own.

At a hardware shop in Ole Kasasi, Barnabas Ruto serves a steady mix of homeowners and builders.

‘We sell finishing equipment like toilets, tiles, pipes, and cement. Our biggest clients are homeowners,’ he say, adding that tiles are among the fastest-moving products.

His business is one small example of how the property boom has spread beyond landowners and developers, creating demand for building materials, transport, labour and other services.

Keeping the connection

For all the new houses, roads and rising property prices, Ole Kasasi has not entirely lost its connection to the landscape that existed before the construction boom.

Mr Kimunyak remembers a time when wild animals were part of everyday life for Maasai residents.

‘Interestingly, in our culture, we believe you can only be attacked by a wild animal if you are cursed or there is something bad that you did that does not please God and man,’ he says.

Urbanisation has since pushed much of that wildlife away from the more populated sections.

The herds and remaining open spaces now share the landscape with construction sites, rental apartments and gated communities.

But as more land is subdivided and more houses rise, Ole Kasasi faces a question familiar to many of Nairobi’s expanding suburbs: how much of the character that made the area desirable can survive the development that is making it valuable?

For now, developers, traders, students, and homeowners are focused on getting the best they can from Ole Kasasi.

Regulatory filings indicate that nine firms increased or maintained dividends despite a fall in profits, while a further nine raised the shareholder payouts at a faster rate than earnings growth.

Absa Bank Kenya, Standard Chartered Bank Kenya (StanChart), BOC Kenya, Centum Investment Company and Kenya Power have raised dividends despite falling profits, while TPS Eastern Africa, CIC Insurance Group, Kenya Re and Liberty Kenya Holdings maintained payouts despite weaker earnings.

Analysts link the dividend payouts to pressure on management to reward investors, the maturity of some listed firms and fewer opportunities for aggressive expansion.

‘The general trend on the NSE over the past two years is that share prices have gone up, with investors moving away from fixed-income instruments and more into equities. There could be some pressure on management to ensure that they deliver returns commensurate with their share price,’ said Erick Musau, executive director for research and sustainable finance at Standard Investment Bank.

This points to companies placing greater emphasis on shareholder returns as they navigate weaker margins, subdued demand and high operating costs in corporate Kenya.

‘Dividend management also helps companies avoid shareholder discontent. If management fails to deliver value to shareholders, that is when they become vulnerable to removal. But when companies reward shareholders through dividends, they become less vulnerable to being replaced,’ said Mr Musau.

BOC Kenya is the latest to raise dividends faster than earnings, increasing its interim payout by 60 percent to Sh4 per share despite a 39.8 percent decline in net profit to Sh100.37 million for the half year ended June.

Absa and StanChart followed the trend, raising interim payouts despite lower half-year earnings.

Absa increased its dividend per share by 150 percent to Sh0.50 from Sh0.20 despite a 9.8 percent decline in net profit to Sh10.53 billion.

StanChart raised its interim payout by 6.3 percent to Sh8.50 despite a 16.8 percent decline in net earnings.

Absa Kenya, which is majority-owned by South Africa’s Absa Group, said it had adequate capital to support loan book and deposit growth without breaching regulatory capital requirements.

‘We have done what we call stress tests on our business, and we are comfortable with our capital levels. So with that, we say we can distribute more earnings. It is not that we are not ready for business. We are, and actually our book has picked up so much,’ said Yusuf Omari, interim CEO at Absa Kenya.

Mr Musau said firms with multinationals as anchor shareholders such as StanChart, BAT Kenya and East African Breweries PLC (EABL) also have an incentive to pay dividends because they provide a key avenue for the top owners to extract returns.

‘For many multinationals, the only way to get money out of the business is by declaring a dividend and, for that matter, as high as possible,’ he said.

The decisions suggest that dividend policy is increasingly being influenced by factors beyond the latest annual earnings figure, including companies’ desire to maintain a record of shareholder returns and confidence that weaker earnings may be temporary.

Read: NSE firms start paying juicy Sh75bn dividends

TotalEnergies Marketing Kenya increased its dividend 79.7 percent to Sh3.45 per share after profit rose 45.6 percent, while BAT Kenya raised its full-year dividend by 40 percent to Sh70 after profit increased 17.1 percent. EABL lifted its dividend by 59 percent to Sh12.70 after net profit rose 49.4 percent.

Kapchorua Tea increased its dividend per share to Sh30 from Sh25 after net profit rose 8.7 percent to Sh196.9 million in the year ended March 2026, taking the total payout to Sh469.4 million.

Williamson Tea returned to a net profit of Sh120.8 million from a Sh166.4 million loss and raised its dividend to Sh15 from Sh10, resulting in a total payout of Sh525.3 million.

Centum increased its dividend 2.5 times to Sh0.78, comprising Sh0.42 ordinary and Sh0.36 special payout, despite an 8.5 percent decline in net profit to Sh743.9 million for the year ended March 2026.

Mr Musau said firms such as Centum now have more room to increase dividends at a faster pace than profits as they emerge from a period of highly leveraged balance sheets. Centum completed a multi-year balance sheet restructuring that left the company debt-free.

‘Firms such as Centum have paid down a lot of their debts now. They are seeing they want to reward the shareholders after a period of drought,’ said Mr Musau.

Banks have added to the trend, with many growing dividends at a faster pace than their profits.

NCBA raised its full-year 2025 dividend by 29.1 percent to Sh7.10 per share, against seven percent profit growth to Sh23.4 billion. Its 2026 interim dividend rose 50 percent to Sh3.75 as first-half profit increased 12.2 percent.

KCB increased its dividend per share by 133 percent to Sh7 in 2025, partly reflecting the sale of National Bank of Kenya, against 11 percent profit growth to Sh68.4 billion. Its interim dividend rose 50 percent to Sh3 in the half year after profit grew 14.2 percent.

DTB and Co-operative Bank also raised dividends faster than profits in 2025, with payouts rising 28.6 percent and 66.7 percent against profit growth of 23 percent and 16.9 percent, respectively.

Other companies have opted to protect rather than increase dividends amid a decline in profits. For instance, TPS Eastern Africa, the operator of Serena Hotel, maintained its Sh0.35 payout despite a 40.2 percent profit decline to Sh787.2 million.

CIC Insurance held its dividend at Sh0.13 despite an 82 percent earnings collapse to Sh513.8 million, while Kenya Re maintained Sh0.15 after profit fell 11.6 percent to Sh3.92 billion. Liberty Kenya also retained its Sh0.50 payout despite a 65.3 percent profit decline to Sh487 million.