Cameroonian Head of State Paul Biya signed an ordinance amending and supplementing certain provisions of the 2021 finance law in order to allow Cameroon to honor its commitments to its international creditors. The presidential act made public on May 26, 2021 primarily targets the settlement of a debt of CFAF 450 billion ($ 838 million) contracted during the issue of the Eurobond in 2015, the repayment deadline of which is at the end of the year. ‘horizon.
“The government is authorized to negotiate and possibly to conclude during fiscal year 2021, under conditions safeguarding the financial interests of the State as well as its economic and political sovereignty, concessional and non-concessional loans of total amounts respectively of 350 billion FCFA (652 million dollars) and 750 billion FCFA (1.3 billion dollars ”, states the new article 49 of the finance law.
Specifically, the presidential ordinance authorizes the government to resort to issues on the international market for an amount of CFAF 450 billion “within the limit of the ceiling of authorized non-concessional loans”, with a view to the partial or total repurchase of the loan. eurobond in progress.
According to the terms of the agreement, this debt is to be settled between 2023 and 2025 to the tune of 150 billion per year. Cameroon, whose debt threshold is 10,334 billion FCFA, reports the Autonomous Amortization Fund (CAA) in its latest economic report published last April, is looking for strategies to obtain flexibility on this schedule.
To face the challenges of development, Cameroon is in negotiations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) with a view to obtaining, next June, financing of 375 billion (698 million dollars) as part of a new agreement on the Extended Credit Facility (ECF). It is for the Cameroonian authorities to multiply strategies to finance development affected by the health crisis linked to the Coronavirus which reduced the growth rate to 2.4% in 2020 against a projection of 4% during the period considered.
