When Kenya enacted the Virtual Assets Service Providers Bill 2025 in October, few truly grasped its potential to revolutionise our national infrastructure ambitions.
For far too long, flagship projects, such as the modernisation of Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), dams and superhighways, among others, have faced hurdles in securing funding without ceding control to opaque partnerships or foreign entities.
This new law is a game-changer, opening the door to blockchain-powered citizen investment, all of which is regulated and safeguarded by Kenyan authorities.
For instance, JKIA is more than a transport hub; it is our vital gateway for trade, tourism, and diplomacy. Despite serving more than eight million passengers annually at its peak, its facilities significantly lag behind those of global counterparts like Ethiopia, Dubai, Doha, or Singapore. The government projects that upgrading JKIA to world-class standards will require an estimated Sh200 billion.
It suffices to say the attempt to modernise through the Adani Group became a cropper due to low trust level by the citizens. While this figure may seem daunting, we can draw inspiration from Ethiopia.
When Addis Ababa embarked on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (Gerd), a $4.8 billion megaproject, international financing proved politically complex due to regional misalignment with Sudan and Egypt.
Ethiopia ingeniously turned to its citizens, issuing bonds, organising lotteries, and launching grassroots campaigns that enabled farmers, civil servants, and the diaspora to contribute.
Citizens didn’t merely donate; they invested in a national asset, fostering widespread ownership and pride. The Gerd was not financed overnight, but this layered citizen participation made it possible without compromising sovereignty.
Kenya can emulate and modernise this spirit through tokenisation, operating under the framework of the new Act. Tokenisation involves transforming a large, illiquid asset into millions of secure, tradable digital units known as tokens.
For JKIA’s redevelopment, the Sh200 billion cost could be divided into 200 million tokens, each valued at Sh1,000. Blockchain technology ensures that every aspect of a token’s issuance, transfer, and revenue distribution is transparent and traceable, visible to all, and impervious to manipulation.
Imagine a boda boda rider in Bungoma purchasing two tokens for Sh2,000, a public school teacher in Nakuru buying 10 tokens, and a major pension fund investing in several million. Each token holder, an individual citizen or an institution, would be entitled to a proportional and equitably allocated share of JKIA’s long-term revenues.
Read: Kenya’s new digital asset law is bold, but is it future-proof?
The opportunity is now at hand; the challenge ahead is for policymakers, financial institutions, and citizens to collectively take the next step and transform ‘our nation’ into a shared endeavour in every meaningful sense.
The Act serves as the crucial safeguard, ensuring this model is not merely another fleeting digital aspiration.
It mandates:
This robust legal foundation addresses the transparency concerns that have previously hindered attempts to introduce private concessionaires at JKIA. Citizens will have clear visibility into how their funds are utilised, how the asset performs, and when payouts are disbursed, all verifiable on the blockchain.
Certainly, challenges lie ahead: investor education is paramount to preventing confusion and scams; robust cybersecurity infrastructure must be in place to guard against hacking; and market volatility needs to be understood. However, with the VASP Act now enacted, these risks can be effectively managed within a regulated and monitored ecosystem.
Tokenising JKIA is more than just a financing strategy; it is a profound statement. It signals to the world that Kenyans are ready to directly own, profit from, and protect their strategic infrastructure.
It mirrors the Gerd narrative but leverages cutting-edge digital finance to simplify participation even further: through mobile money integrations, diaspora investment portals, and licensed exchanges where tokens can be freely traded.
In the coming years, as flights from global capitals land at JKIA and passengers disembark into upgraded terminals, Kenyans will be walking through a building they partly own. The revenue generated from every coffee sold in the departure lounge, every cargo shipment processed, will flow back to thousands, perhaps millions of Kenyan stakeholders.
From law to ledger, and from ledger to prosperity, the VASP Act 2025 has provided the framework to achieve what once seemed impossible: funding national projects through national ownership.
This principle extends beyond infrastructure like JKIA to encompass all national and sub-national investments, including agriculture and manufacturing. While this may sound futuristic, it represents a crucial path to engaging millennials, Gen Z, and Gen Alphas in the national investment realm.
The writer is a Public Policy expert, Former CEO at KAM and CEO, Visible Industries Ltd
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