Selling the Crown Jewel: What Kenya’s Safaricom Deal Really Means

Derry Thornalley
Dec 15, 2025
5 min read

Kenya is cashing in its crown jewel.

In the biggest privatisation move in nearly 20 years, the government has agreed to sell a 15% stake in Safaricom – East Africa’s most valuable company – to Vodacom/Vodafone for roughly $1.6 billion, cutting the state’s holding from 35% to 20% and handing majority control to the South African group.

The deal is priced at KES 34 per share, a hefty premium to recent market levels, and includes an upfront payment of about KES 40.2 billion for the rights to future dividends on the state’s remaining 20% stake.

In total, Treasury expects around KES 244–245 billion in proceeds – seed capital for a new National Infrastructure Fund that will co-finance roads, power, water and airports, and a fiscal lifeline for a government squeezed by debt, weak aid flows and fierce resistance to further tax hikes.

For supporters, it’s smart portfolio management: swap a slice of a mature asset for growth-enabling infrastructure.For critics, it’s short-termism: selling a strategic, cash-generating fintech and mobile giant just as the digital economy is taking off.

Man in a suit stands on a rocky hill, viewing highway construction with cranes. Modern glass buildings and cars in the urban background.

The truth sits, uncomfortably, in between.

Why sell Safaricom now?

The timing is not accidental.

Kenya’s public finances are under intense pressure. External debt service already consumes more than 40% of government revenues, according to Treasury, and last year’s attempt to plug the gap through aggressive tax rises helped trigger mass protests and a political backlash that forced a rethink.

At the same time, the Central Bank of Kenya has cut rates nine meetings in a row, taking the policy rate from 13% in mid-2024 to 9% in December 2025, in an effort to spur private-sector lending and growth.

Inflation is a manageable 4–5%, but growth stuck around 5% is not enough to out-run high borrowing costs and a young, fast-growing population.

In that context, the Safaricom sale does three things at once:

Raises large, upfront cash without new taxes or Eurobonds.
Seeds a dedicated infrastructure vehicle to crowd in private capital.
Deepens Kenya’s relationship with a strategic private operator (Vodacom/Vodafone) that already runs the network.

For a Treasury hemmed in on all sides, it’s one of the few big levers left.

What’s actually on the table?

Strip away the politics and you have a fairly straightforward package:

15% of Safaricom sold by government to Vodacom’s Kenyan holding structure at KES 34 per share, a 20%+ premium to recent prices.
Government stake falls from 35% to 20%; Vodacom/Vodafone’s effective control rises to just under 55%; the free float remains around 25%.
A separate upfront payment for dividend rights on the residual 20%, giving Treasury cash now instead of waiting for future cashflows.
Proceeds earmarked to capitalise a National Infrastructure Fund which will take equity and mezzanine positions in roads, energy, irrigation and airport upgrades, alongside private partners.

This is not a fire sale. Kenya has negotiated an above-market price and structured the deal to pull forward value.

The real debate is about what it gives up.

Safaricom is not just another telco. It is:

The backbone of Kenya’s mobile and data network.
The operator of M-Pesa, the country’s dominant mobile money and digital payments system.
A consistent dividend payer that has helped anchor government finances and domestic investors’ portfolios.

Selling a slice of that stability to fund roads and dams is, in effect, a macro asset swap.

Pensions, PPPs and the new infrastructure game

The Safaricom sale does not happen in isolation.

Just weeks earlier, Kenya confirmed a $1.5 billion highway expansion deal with Chinese contractors, with NSSF taking a major equity stake in a 28-year toll road concession.

At the same time, new data show that Kenyan pension funds have nearly doubled their allocations to “alternative assets” – including infrastructure, private equity and real estate – to about KES 126 billion by mid-2025. NSSF alone now manages over KES 558 billion, up sharply from 2024, with most assets outsourced to private fund managers.

Regionally, policymakers are talking about pooling up to $400 billion of East African pension assets into mega-funds to attack a $1.3 trillion infrastructure gap.

In other words, Kenya is:

Selling part of a mature digital asset (Safaricom)…
Shifting domestic retirement savings into long-dated infrastructure…
And riding a broader East African trend to use pension money and PPPs to build roads, power, ports and data pipes.

That may be smart – if the projects are well-chosen, contracts are robust and political risk is managed.

If not, it concentrates the risk of policy mistakes directly in the savings of workers and retirees.

Who wins, who worries?

Winners (potentially):

Treasury – gains fiscal space and infrastructure capital without new Eurobonds.
Vodacom/Vodafone – secure majority control of a profitable, strategically important asset.
Safaricom – gains a clearer strategic owner and access to group expertise and balance sheet.
Infrastructure developers – get a better-capitalised local partner in the National Infrastructure Fund.

Worriers:

Domestic investors who liked the state as an anchor shareholder and fear more aggressive commercial decisions under majority foreign control.
Civil society and parts of the opposition, who see the sale as surrendering long-term digital sovereignty for short-term cash.
Pension trustees, who must now juggle exposure to Safaricom (often a top equity holding) with rising allocations to illiquid infrastructure and a still-heavy position in Kenya’s sovereign debt.

For them, the key question is not just: “Was the price good?”It’s: “What does this do to our overall risk profile?”

Where Verī Platform fits in this new landscape

This is exactly the kind of environment Verī Platform is built for – one where:

State assets are being sold,
Pension money is moving into roads and power,
Banks and asset managers are balancing local and global risks,
And regulators want a cleaner line of sight across everything.

For Kenyan banks, asset managers, pension funds and insurers, Verī can act as the quiet infrastructure underneath:

Total exposure to Safaricom – equity, bonds, green bonds, Safaricom-heavy funds – visible in one place, at portfolio, client and institution level.
Look-through view of infrastructure risk – toll roads, energy projects and other PPPs funded via the National Infrastructure Fund, NSSF vehicles and external managers.
Integrated sovereign and macro risk – Kenya government bonds, syndicated loans and guarantees sitting alongside Safaricom and PPP exposure, so boards can see how much ultimately depends on the same economy and policy decisions.
Regulator-friendly reporting – giving the Retirement Benefits Authority, CBK and CMA a clear picture of concentration, currency and duration risks without forcing institutions into costly bespoke builds.

Verī doesn’t say whether Kenya should sell Safaricom or how much infrastructure risk a pension fund should carry.

It provides the plumbing so that, when those decisions are made, every stakeholder can actually see the consequences– on member outcomes, capital ratios and systemic risk – rather than flying blind.

Kenya’s Safaricom sale is more than a headline about a telco stake.

It is a marker of a deeper shift in African finance:

From aid and Eurobonds to domestic balance sheets and PPPs.
From government-owned “crown jewels” to strategic private control.
From fragmented exposures to a need for integrated, real-time risk visibility.

Whether history records this as a masterstroke or a missed opportunity will depend less on the sale price – and more on what Kenya builds with the proceeds, and how well its financial system manages the risks that come with this new playbook.

#Kenya #Safaricom #Vodacom #africafinance #privatisation #infrastructure #pensionfunds #PPPs #digitalfinance #VeriPlatform #capitalmarkets

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