Kenya is about to make history as the third country to loss its property to the Chinese over failure to pay its loans. This is according to the Auditor General Eliud Ouko who revealed that the government risks losing the strategic Mombasa Port to China’s Exim Bank if it fails to pay a sh. 227 billion owed to the institution.
The government borrowed the money construct the controversial Mombasa-Nairobi SGR and now Ouko believes that the country’s sovereignty might be at stake.
“Exim Bank would become a principle over KPA if KRC defaults in its obligations and the Chinese bank exercises power over the escrow account security,” a management letter sent to the KPA reads.
The news have raised angry reactions from Kenyans online:
EXIM BANK of China should take Mt. Kenya and all Tea Farms in the Rift Valley for their. It is that part of Kenya that supported the grandiose of SGR by UhuRuto. Birds coming home to roost. Sisi Wapwani na watu wa Baba hatutaki balaa Indian Ocean na Lake Victoria.
— Mwambeo Mwang’ombe (@Apamwambeo) December 19, 2018
Those consequences we were warned about are here with us.
Those consequences have nothing to do with Raila Odinga.
They have everything to do with Chinese invasion that was engineered by Uhuru in collaboration with Exim Bank of China. Na bado!
— A Karani Onsomu (@erwoti) December 19, 2018
Facts are slowly coming out.The Exim bank of China to take over Mombasa port next year should this man eating regime fail to service the loans they took.Our revolution will also start around that time.History is in the offing sooner than later
— Erick Atitwa (@AtitwaGmail) December 19, 2018
In December 2017, the Sri Lankan government lost its Hambantota port to China for a lease period of 99 years after failing to show commitment in the payment of billions of dollars in loans.
The transfer, according to the New York Times, gave China control of the territory just a few hundred miles off the shores of rival India.
It is a strategic foothold along a critical commercial and military waterway.
“The case is also one of the examples of China’s ambitious use of loans and aid to gain influence around the world – and of its willingness to play hardball to collect,” says the New York Times of December 12, 2017.
In September 2018, Zambia lost its international airport to China over debt repayment.