NAIROBI, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The International Monetary Fund (IMF) clarified on Wednesday that Kenya still has access to the 1.5-billion-U.S.-dollar standby credit facility since June 2017.
IMF Resident Representative in Nairobi Jan Mikkelsen said the facility is available until the end of March and was not suspended seven months ago due to non-compliance with fiscal deficit targets.
"The precautionary Stand-By Arrangement and a Stand-By Credit Facility (SBA/SCF) arrangement remains in place until end-March 2018," Mikkelsen said in a statement issued in Nairobi.
He said the second and third reviews of the program, due respectively in June and December 2017, could not be completed on schedule as agreement could not be reached on stronger fiscal policies, and discussions were postponed due to the prolonged election period.
"Kenya continues to have access to resources since June subject to policy understandings to complete the outstanding reviews," Mikkelsen said.
He said an IMF staff team is currently in Nairobi for discussions on a possible new program.
Media reports on Tuesday said the East African nation's access to the facility had been lost due to lack of an agreement, blaming the Treasury and the Central Bank Kenya (CBK) for hiding the issue from the public.
Kenya had received approval to access the facility in March 2016 to provide a policy anchor for continued macroeconomic and institutional reform, and help mitigate the impact of potential exogenous shocks to the economy if they were to materialize.
