The IMF’s chief stated on Thursday that Zambia has agreed a debt agreement with its foreign creditors, offering financial relief to the first African country to default since the Covid outbreak.
Zambia signs deal with creditors: In June, Zambia and its creditors, including China and Western countries, reached a preliminary agreement on a $6.3 billion debt, but they had not yet formalized the accord.
At the IMF-World Bank annual conference in Marrakesh, Morocco, Kristalina Georgieva, the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, announced that Zambia’s creditors “have finally signed a memorandum of understanding.”
At a panel discussion on reducing debt around the world, Georgieva made the statement with Situmbeko Musokotwane, the finance minister of Zambia.
The creditors, according to Musokotwane, “have been fantastic.”
“But that by itself is not enough to provide the kind of life that these young people in Africa want to live,” he added.
“What will bring that about? Increased economic growth will generate jobs, preventing young people from travelling across the Sahara and the Mediterranean.