 |
|
| Author |
 Topic  |
|
|
Momodou
Denmark
11804 Posts |
 Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 12:51:05
|
GAMBIA NEEDS DEBT RELIEF TO MEET MDGs
(NATIONAL DEBT STRATEGY WORKSHOP)
By Bubacarr K. Sowe
The Gambia is considered to be a Highly Indebted Poor Country (HIPC). The boards of the World Bank and IMF have established standards to enable a country to reach completion point based on the criteria set to achieve debt relief. All countries which are heavily indebted and poor need debt strategy. This is why SoS Musa Gibril Bala Gaye, Secretary of State for Finance and Economic Affairs, stated that "The country has just commenced implementing faithfully the Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) so as to reach completion point under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative (HIPC) with its associated debt relief."
Mr. Gaye was speaking on Monday 12th February at a 10 day workshop on National Debt and New Financing Strategy Analysis Workshop, held at the Paradise Suite Hotel which was jointly organised by the West African Institute for Financial and Economic Management (WAIFEM) and Debt Relief International (DRI).
SoS Gaye said, among other things, that before Gambia reached decision point under the Enhance HIPC initiative in year 2000, a debt sustainability analysis was conducted for the country in May 2000 in conjunction with the IMF and World Bank.
He indicated that the Debt Sustainability analysis revealed that "total external public debt stock stood at $452 million in nominal terms; that is over 12 billion dalasis in 2000. He added that the ratio of debt to GDP, debt to export and debt to revenue were 59%, 217%, 332%, respectively. He added that debt service payment in 1999 was 19.9 million dollars or 16% of export earnings.
SoS Gaye expressed that Gambia's main creditors were the multilaterals accounting for 70 percent of debt, of which 32% was owed to IDA (World Bank,) 22 percent to the AFDB (African Development Bank) and 3 percent to the IMF. Bilateral creditors accounted for the remaining 30 percent, of which one third was due to Paris Club and two thirds to non-Paris club creditors.
According to SoS Gaye, the findings from the Debt Sustainability Analysis motivated the Boards of the International Development Association (IDA) and the IMF to approve decision point status for the Gambia meaning that it could benefit from a debt relief package amounting to US$66.6 million or 1832 million dalasis. The package included an interim relief in the form of debt service reduction by IDA, IMF and the African Development Bank.
The Secretary of State indicated that the Gambia was supposed to reach completion point by 2002.
However the Gambia failed to do so because of what he termed as "slippages arising from a combination of exogenous stocks, fiscal out turns and accommodating monetary policy which impeded the implementation of the PRGF (Poverty Reduction Growth Facility). SoS Gaye promised that after implementing a staff monitored programme, (a conditionality imposed by the IMF), between October 2005 to March 2006 the way has been paved for the restoration of PRGF from January 2007. He promised that they will attain the completion point established by the IMF by mid year. He expressed his conviction that "The attainment of completion point will enable the Gambia to obtain the debt relief it was promised at decision point and the relief from the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative (MDRI), including the UK Initiative.
SoS Gaye informed the workshop that the debt stock was 5.5 billion dalasis in 2000 that it rose to 10.8 billion dalasis in 2002, 17.2 billion dalasis in 2004 and 18 billion dalasis in 2005.
The Secretary of State indicated that between 1999 and 2005, the external debt grow by 36%. It added that "The growth reflected largely new disbursements, estimated at about 217 million dollars (6.06 billion dalasis) from the multilateral agencies, World Bank, African Development Bank, the Islamic Development and other bilaterals such as the Kuwaiti fund and Republic of Taiwan - China.
The Secretary of State concluded that "The Gambia is a low income country with heavy need for continuous borrowing in order to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which is a great challenge. In this connection, it could leverage the recently launched World Bank/IMF debt sustainability framework for Low Income Countries (DSF for LICs) assessment. The assessment for The Gambia bears eloquent testimony for the imperative of debt relief. Results indicate that, with the full delivery of both HIPC and MDRI relief, The Gambia is deemed to be in debt stress. Against the indicative thresholds of 30% for NPV of debt-to-GDP in 2005, The Gambia recorded 83.5%; with regard to export criteria with indicative threshold of 100%, The recorded 312.3%. in that same year, the debt service ratio hit 21.1% compared with the indicative threshold of 15%."
The workshop is to consider the fact he gave in their analysis.
Foroyaa Newspaper Burning Issue
Issue No. 18/2007, 14-15 February, 2007
|
A clear conscience fears no accusation - proverb from Sierra Leone |
|
|
jambo
3300 Posts |
Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 13:45:49
|
gambia is in debt for how much  , where did the money go this is an outrageous amount of money for a small country, is there a paper trail for this, who signed the original documents |
 |
|
|
jambo
3300 Posts |
Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 13:45:49
|
| gambia is in debt for how much, where did the money go this is an outrageous amount of money for a small country, is there a paper trail for this, who signed the original documents |
|
|
|
toubab1020
12314 Posts |
Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 14:19:43
|
Errrrrrrrr...........Paper trail?.........signed what?
|
"Simple is good" & I strongly dislike politics. You cannot defend the indefensible.
|
|
|
|
toubab1020
12314 Posts |
Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 14:19:43
|
Errrrrrrrr...........Paper trail?.........signed what?
|
"Simple is good" & I strongly dislike politics. You cannot defend the indefensible.
|
|
|
|
jambo
3300 Posts |
Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 14:22:58
|
| someon signed the original documents for money to be released to gambia, but who signed on behalf of gambia |
|
|
|
jambo
3300 Posts |
Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 14:22:58
|
| someon signed the original documents for money to be released to gambia, but who signed on behalf of gambia |
|
|
|
kondorong
Gambia
4380 Posts |
Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 21:41:57
|
Paper trail? Did you not see Arch 22, the Airport and the Kombo Coastal Road. Thats where the money went. They were loans.
Arch 22 is a national monument attracting tourism and creating jobs. The airport is first class in West Africa. The Kerewan Bridge which has earned the president the title:BAA BILI MANSA is another project from loans. |
|
|
|
kondorong
Gambia
4380 Posts |
Posted - 15 Feb 2007 : 21:41:57
|
Paper trail? Did you not see Arch 22, the Airport and the Kombo Coastal Road. Thats where the money went. They were loans.
Arch 22 is a national monument attracting tourism and creating jobs. The airport is first class in West Africa. The Kerewan Bridge which has earned the president the title:BAA BILI MANSA is another project from loans. |
|
|
| |
Topic |
|
|
|
| Bantaba in Cyberspace |
© 2005-2024 Nijii |
|
|
|
Topic Locked
