By Amb. Emmanuel Mwamba
Celebrating Debt contraction, debt restructure, sale of Mopani and KCM
I’ve always wondered why we celebrate what should normally cause us to worry.
● We celebrated when Zambia issued its debut 10-year Eurobond of US$750 million international sovereign bond on 13th September, 2012.
● We celebrate the sale of KCM & Mopani, assets that should bring billions of dollars and must be key to developing the country.
● We celebrated when IMF signaled its Staff-level agreement of a $1.3 bail-out loan.
● We celebrated the reschedule of debt from paying for it now to paying for it in twenty years time.
Key Points on Debt Reschedule
1. In 2010, Zambia attained the lower middle income status. The IMF shepherded 12 African countries to the Eurobond and commercial markets. IMF stated that the environment was conducive for African nations to tap into the international debt markets as an alternative funding source away from foreign aid and multilateral institutions. So the IMF must not escape this blame. Ask Dr. Situmbeko Musokotwane.
●In its first tranche,Zambia obtained $750m while Kenya ($1 billion), Ghana ($3 billion), Benin (€1 billion), Senegal (€0.8 billion), Ivory Coast (€0.85 billion), and Cameroon (€0.7 billion) all obtained this new form of development financing. Before this only South Africa and Seychelles had obtained Eurobonds in 2007.
● China also came on the scene with project and infrastructure financing under the Belt and Road Initiative. Zambia, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Ghana, Egypt among others benefitted from these new loans from China.
● After the debt sustainabilty analysis conducted in 2017/2018 tvat established that Zambia was debt distressed, the PF pursued the restructure of Chinese loans under bilateral arrangements.
Infact a few loans such as the $90million Levy Mwanawasa stadium were written off. PF hired Lazard Feres from France, who have been key negotiators under UPND debt restructure negotiations program, to handle the Eurobond and other commercial creditors.
● the UPND have missed an opportunity to get debt write-off or debt forgiveness from China with the approach they took through the IMF and G20 Framework. The key principle here is the uniform treatment of debt and creditors. Eurobond holders and others would never agree to a debt write-off.
● Under the agreements on the debt reschedule, the debt has just been rescheduled to 12-20 years.
The problem has NOT gone away. It has been pushed to another, a future government.
● Government has to begin servicing its debt since December 2020.
Infact that financial outlay has been taken away.
● Under this new agreement, Eurobond holders have to receive $187million now.
Any default takes the country to original status.
● $800million- In 3 years only, Zambia has accumulated interest service arreas on the Eurobond alone of $800million. How much interest has Zambia paid in the last 10 years on its $3billion debt?
Mwamba, you are not very different the current incompetent conmen governing us. What you are saying is indeed true, though you should have practiced what you are preaching when you were in power. Now see the problems you have landed us in. People were forced to vote for the devil just to get rid of you. In 2026, we will vote for even a dog to replace the devil. At least a dog will be loyal to us, the owners.
Indigo Tyrol your reasoning and thinking capacity is below that of a normal person. From your utterances you lack civility and power to reason properly. If you analyse the rubbish that Emmanuel Mwamba has written who are conmen and crooks is it not the PF who contracted the huge debts which they also failed to pay but ended up misappropriating public funds.
You creat a mess and cause suffering on the people and when someone comes to put things right you begin to undermine and mock him. Indigo Tyrol you are rude and sarcastic try to be sobre and gentle otherwise your bitterness and anger will land you in problems.
It is only hooligans and thugs from the PF who discredit what the new dawn government has done in restructuring the debt.
Learn to give credit where credit is due. Also, criticism should be constructive and genuine.
Ba Mwamba, kanshi which planet does he come from? Look, the celebration we’ve now is debt restructuring, which debt was carelessly contracted by his government. It must be shameful to have such a mindset where you cause a problem and someone comes to provide a solution then you start mocking them. Please fellow citizens let’s watch some of these people as we go into annnnny election.
You are right.
What does Mr. Mwamba hope to achieve by this negativity?
Bwamba, please don’t forget who contracted this debt. Let’s not forget who defaulted not once, but twice. Clearly you shameless idiots had zero intention of paying back this money. For you and your ilk, national leadership was a joy ride with ZERO responsibility. And now you are adding insult to injury by mocking those who have worked tirelessly to clean the floor after you sh!tted on it. Zambians will NEVER EVER give you the opportunity that you squandered recklessly. Please continue your shameless mockery – it is after all a reflection of your innermost character – shameless misleaders, career criminals and joy riders.
If you are in deep s##t and you find a breathing window, that has to be celebrated because it gives you more time to live. What should not be celebrated is the team that put you in the s##t because that team is a team of ruthless killers
Mwamba you’re an idiot and foolish, why didn’t you pay the debt in ten years that you accumulated it,why didn’t you use your plans to wipe out this mess you created and now someone has negotiated that atlist you pay after a period of time to give you chance to work out on your economy, where did you think you could find the money when all the mines were closed by your reckless government, just shut up idiot
I’ve not even wasted my time to read the rubbish Emmanuel mwamba has written because I know it’s just a bunch of shit. However, if mwamba was sensible, he would have thought twice before writing this bulshit because his silly pf party is the one that landed us innocent Zambians to where we’re!!!!! What arrogance and stupidity!!!