Ruto Responds To Damning Hustler Fund Report
President William Ruto has responded to reports calling for the Hustler Fund’s dissolution, arguing that the money has primarily benefited Small, Medium, and Micro Enterprises (SMMEs).
Ruto spoke at a private sector roundtable on Wednesday, August 6, and enumerated some of the fund’s perks. The fund was created in 2022 with an initial capital of Ksh 50 billion.
In response to criticism from the Kenya Human Rights Commission’s (“Failing the Hustlers”) report, Ruto emphasized that, while the fund has problems, it benefits Kenyans immensely.
This is because it is still one of the most reliable predictors of their credit ratings.
We take pride in the success of the Hustler Fund that has in under three years disbursed more than Sh72 billion to over 26 million Kenyans.
— William Samoei Ruto, PhD (@WilliamsRuto) August 6, 2025
In the same period, this transformative initiative, with a repayment rate at 83.6 per cent, has mobilised over Sh5 billion in savings and… pic.twitter.com/xt2M1VWuDc
“Today, under the Hustler Fund, your credit behaviour becomes your collateral. It becomes what licenses you to borrow the next bigger amount of money,” President Ruto explained.
The Head of State also spoke to the Hustler Fund’s bridging loan program, which he claims has benefited nearly 650,000 Kenyans.
According to Ruto, the government has access to 26 million Kenyans’ credit histories via the Hustler Fund.
This has aided the government in establishing alternative collateral channels, such as loans and logbooks, in addition to traditional methods.
He added, “For your information, banks are now beginning to absorb those who have come through for the hustler funds because they have gone through the hustler fund records.”
“They may not have a title deed or logbook, but they are well-behaved borrowers and business people.”
President Ruto today:
— Mwango Capital (@MwangoCapital) August 6, 2025
"….critics are spreading fear and despondency by falsely claiming that the Fund has a 60% default rate. That is a deliberate distortion of facts. The truth – backed by data – is that the Hustler Fund has a recovery rate of 83.3%, nearly identical to that… https://t.co/DQnWEW3CQj pic.twitter.com/FyK92cJrpw
The president further rejected the KHRC’s default rate figure of 68%, claiming that the Hustler Fund had a repayment record of 83%.
President Ruto further accused the KHRC of elitism, claiming that the study did not consider the plight of the average person.
“I want to persuade my good friends from Nairobi and posh hotels that there are Kenyans who today have a mechanism for them to borrow money,” the president went on.
“For your information, these people who borrow Ksh5,000 or Ksh10,000 have mobilised Ksh5 billion in savings over the last 3 years.”
According to the KHRC’s study, by the end of 2022, there would be a 68.3 percent default rate, which means that for every Ksh500 loan disbursed, Ksh340 would be effectively lost.
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According to the commission, these losses did not account for the systematic costs of implementing the scheme.
With this in mind, the KHRC believes that 71.5% of all Hustler Fund loans are functionally unrecoverable.
Ruto’s reaction comes just one day after Wycliffe Oparanya, Cabinet Secretary for the Ministry of Co-operatives, accused the commission of influencing the 2022/2023 Auditor General’s report.
Oparanya stated that many of the problems raised in the study had not yet been resolved.
Ruto Responds To Damning Hustler Fund Report
