Micro, Small and Media Enterprises PS Susan Mangeni. Photo | Courtesy.
The government has now warned that it is going to institute forceful recovery of Hustler Funds loaned to Kenyans. This comes as millions of citizens have defaulted the loans, jeopardizing the funds’ sustainability.
Appearing before the parliamentary Committee on Special Funds, Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises PS Susan Mang’eni and Hustler Fund acting Chief Executive Elizabeth Nkukuu said that defaulters have money but refuses to pay, citing that the average amount of money transacted in their Mpesa wallets is Sh21,000 per month.
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Nkukuu told the committee that Hustler Fund loans will be deducted from Mpesa or airtime, should the defaulters refuse to pay. She said they are in conversation with a mobile money operator to enable them to deduct money directly from the defaulter’s accounts. However she stated that legal means will be used in the process.
“They are people of means, it’s not that they cannot pay, they are people who just don’t want to pay,” Nkukuu told the committee.
But Nkukuu said they will try to reach out to the defaulters to urge them to pay their loans before any forceful means are deployed.
“We will use a nagging recovery method whereby we will be calling the defaulters to remind them to pay. After this, we will now use legal means to get money from their wallets or airtime,” she said.
On her part, PS Mang’eni warned that they will segment the defaulters since they have all their details and institute forceful recovery.
“We are going to segment them, then we institute a forceful recovery. We know them, we have their phone numbers, unique identifiable numbers and the ID numbers with US,” PS Mang’eni told the committee.
Hustler Fund is one of Kenya Kwanza’s flagship initiatives to enable Kenyans who cannot acquire credit from commercial banks to get loans to boost their small businesses. The fund was launched in 2022 and has since loaned billions of shillings to more than 24 million Kenyans as of February 2025.
