The IMF MD, Kristalina Georgieva has turned Zambia into a bad case study of “how not to negotiate deals with creditors”. She has advised Ghanaian President to keep national interests in mind when negotiating deals with creditors and avoid being arm-twisted like what was done to Zambia!
Is this is not betrayal? The IMF has been touting Zambia as a good example of frugal managers of national debt and debt restructuring icons. But the IMF MD statement in Ghana means only three things:
(1) Zambian negotiators did not take into account national interest when dealing with bondholders, hence the bad results of those negotiations.
(2) Zambia is incapable of resisting arm-twisting by international creditors.
(3) Zambia has reached bad agreement with bondholders, and she blames the country for such bad deals (the type that Ghana must avoid at all costs)
But how can this be when we have hired best international transaction advisors to lead our negotiations with creditors (including private bondholders and other commercial lenders)? So our money has been wasted?
Lesson to Zambian leaders.
Learn to listen to your nationals on matters of national importance. You lose nothing and you have everything to gain. The IMF MD knew all along that our debt-restructuring efforts lacked the most important ingredient- defense of our national interest. We have just been obsessed with reaching agreement without regard to consequences, simply to show that we are better than those who contracted the debt in the first place!
My advice- reverse what is going on in the mining industry before it is too late. Everything being done in that sector is devoid of defense of national interest. The Mopani, KCM and Kansanshi mine deals are all devoid of care for the future of this nation, care for the needs of our future generations. We don’t need the IMF and the World Bank to use us again as a case study of bad investment negotiators.
All these deals being made in the mining sector are a betrayal of our national interest and they are simply setting up foundations for their future reversal. Even those investors agreeing to enter into such deals must know that the future of such investment is impaired. They will last only as long as the UPND Government lasts.
Patriotic Front
Facebook post
We turned ourself into a case study of how not to run an economy when we got ourself into debt distress
The source or author of this story is not credible. The idiots are filled with envy, malice and stupidity of the highest level. Nothing the idiots say will change anything. All they are are STUPID IDIOTS.