Kenya’s President William Ruto has again urged African countries to consider settling cross-border transactions with their respective currencies instead of the U.S. dollar. In his remarks made while addressing the Djibouti parliament, Ruto argued that the African continent’s Afreximbank already has the mechanism in place to enable seamless settling of transactions between traders.
The latest remarks by the Kenyan leader, whose country is among several African nations facing dollar shortages, come just a few weeks after he similarly implored his counterparts to kickstart the process to ditch the U.S. dollar. Ruto believes trade between African countries is already hampered by the differences between their respective currencies. He said asking traders to source U.S. dollars only makes things worse.
In a video circulating on social media platforms, Ruto doubled down on his earlier call on African countries to de-dollarize, but said that “we are not against the U.S. dollar.” He also questioned why Kenyan and Djibouti traders need to settle transactions using the greenback. He asked:
Why is it necessary for us to buy things from Djibouti and pay in dollars? Why? There is no reason. And we are not against the U.S. dollar, we just want to trade much more freely. Let us pay in U.S. dollars what we are buying from the U.S.
According to the Kenyan leader, African countries ought to settle trades occurring on the continent using local currencies.
Commenting on Ruto’s remarks, internet freedom advocate and entrepreneur Kimdotcom warned of the consequences for the United States if more countries were to heed the call.
“Africa says bye to the US dollar. The President of Kenya, William Ruto urges African nations to dump USD under tumultuous applause. With every nation that rejects USD as reserve currency the US Govt will pay a higher price for printing money (inflation),” he said.
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