- He takes over an economy crippled with debt, inflation, joblessness, high cost of basic commodities and hunger.
- He has been the Governor of the Central Bank of Kenya from March 2007 to March 2015.
Former Central Bank governor Njuguna Ndung’u returns to public service to drive President William Ruto’s economic agenda.
Ndung’u is set to take charge of the National Treasury at a time when the economy is crippled with debt, inflation, joblessness, high cost of basic commodities and hunger.
According to a record from the National Treasury, as of June 2022, Kenya’s debt stood at Sh8.6 trillion.
During campaigns, Ruto made the economy the main focus of his crusade, promising to reverse dwindling economic fortunes.
Ndung’u is poised to steer Ruto’s bottom-up economic model, which took centre stage in his campaigns.
Ndung’u was an Associate Professor of economics at the University of Nairobi. He has been the Governor of the Central Bank of Kenya from March 2007 to March 2015.
He has lectured in advanced economic theory and econometrics at the university and has published widely in international journals as well as chapters in various books on economic policy issues.
He was the first to complete two terms of four years each since the law was put in place in 1982.
He had just taken over at CBK when Safaricom launched MPesa, a mobile money transfer service that has put Kenya on the global technology map.
Ndung’u will replace Ukur Yatani who was appointed in January 2020 after serving from July 2019 in an acting capacity.
Prior to being governor, he was the Director of Training at the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC), a capacity-building network in Africa in economic policy and analytical capacity.
He is a member of the Brookings Africa Growth Initiative (AGI) Distinguished Advisory Group.7
Ndung’u has also been a member of the Advisory Committee of the Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI).
Ndung’u has previously served as a member of the Global Advisory Council (GAC) of the World Economic Forum (WEF), Visiting Fellow of Practice at the Blavatnik School of Government, Oxford University (2015/16), Africa Regional Office of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) of Canada, 2001-2003.
He also served as a Principal Analyst and Head of the Macro Economic and Econometrics Modelling Division of the Kenya Institute for Public Policy Research and Analysis, (KIPPRA) from 1999 – 2001.
He led a team to develop the Kenyan macro-model that has been in use for forecasting growth and fiscal stance since 2001. Prof Njuguna Ndung’u holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden.
He studied Bachelor of Economics at the University of Nairobi and did his Master’s in the same institution.