| IMF Has $51M For Burkina
Faso After Inner City Press Asked of Cameroon
and Ivory Coast
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon Video
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SDNY COURTHOUSE,
Nov 13 – When the
International Monetary Fund
addressed sub Saharan Africa
on October 21, Inner City
Press posed questions on
Cameroon and on Cote d'Ivoire.
Inner City Press
asked the IMF's Abebe Aemro
Selassie, Director, African
Department: "On Cameroon, in
light of the October 21
announcement of additional
COVID-related aid, what
safeguards are in place to
engage a lack of corruption in
distribution, and to prevent
the torture which many human
rights groups allege?"
His answer
involved assurances that the
beneficial owners of companies
getting government contracts,
for COVID and otherwise,
should be made public. Video here.
Now on
November 13 from the IMF on
Burkina Faso, this: "The
Executive Board of the
International Monetary Fund
(IMF) today completed the
fourth and fifth reviews of
Burkina Faso’s economic
program under the Extended
Credit Facility (ECF).
Completion of these reviews,
which constitute the last two
under the ECF-supported
program, unlocks access to SDR
36.12 million (about US$51.28
million), bringing total
disbursements under the
arrangement to SDR 108.36
million (about
US$152.58million). Burkina
Faso’s three-year ECF
arrangement was approved by
the IMF Executive Board on
March 14, 2018. It aims at
maintaining macroeconomic
stability, reducing poverty
and creating fiscal space for
priority spending. The
Executive Board also approved
the authorities’ requests for
a waiver for the nonobservance
of the program performance
criterion on the ceiling on
net domestic financing of the
government and rephasing of
access for the fifth review to
make the sixth disbursement
available on November 13,
2020. In addition, Burkina
Faso has benefited from a
second tranche of debt relief
on its debt service falling
due to the IMF from October
14, 2020 to April 13, 2021
(SDR 10.3 million or about US$
14.52 million), in the form of
grant assistance under the
Catastrophe Containment and
Relief Trust. This relief
follows that granted for debt
service due between April 14
and October 13, 2020 (about
US$12 million). The economic
impacts of the global and
domestic measures to contain
the COVID19 pandemic have been
stronger than expected. Real
GDP is expected to contract by
2.8 percent in 2020, compared
to a forecast of 6.0 percent
expansion prior to the
pandemic. The fiscal deficit
in 2020 is expected to widen
to about 5.3 percent of GDP,
to accommodate an effective
response to the fallout from
COVID19 and security shocks.
The main risks to the outlook
are the uncertainty
surrounding the duration of
the pandemic and the ongoing
security crisis. Following the
Executive Board’s discussion
on Burkina Faso, Mr. Mitsuhiro
Furusawa, Deputy Managing
Director and Acting Chair,
issued the following
statement: 'The COVID19
pandemic and the security
crisis continue to negatively
impact Burkina Faso’s
economy.'"
Back in
October, Inner City Press also
asked about Cote d'Ivoire,
where IMF alumni Ouattara is
running for a third term. The
answer was largely praising
Cote d'Ivoire economic
diversity. Here's
the transcript:
MR. VILKAS:
Thank you. The next
question is also now through
Webex. It's Matthew Lee
who wants to ask
questions. Matthew, do
you hear
us?
MR. LEE:
Thanks a lot. I wanted
to know, I saw yesterday, the
announcement of continued
disbursement to Cameroon and
obviously it is a country in
need, but there are a lot of
issues that have risen, not
only about human right issues,
or people that have fled the
country due to conflict in the
northwest and southwest, but
also some alleged corruption
in the distribution of
COVID‑19 aid. So, I'm
wondering, if you can, kind
of, as you can say, how does
-- how do the general
principals of ensuring that
this aid actually helps
people? How are they
implemented, generally and
specifically in
Cameroon?
And just finally, on Côte
d'Ivoire there's controversy
of your alumni Alassane
Ouattara. Without
getting into the politics of
that, what's a been the impact
of the pandemic on Côte
d'Ivoire and what are your
views on its prospects going
forward? Thanks a
lot.
MR.
SELASSIE: Thanks.
On Cameroon, of course,
conditions remain very
difficult socially, and
economically as a result of
the pandemic. And
yesterday, actually we had --
we went to the Board for
disbursements there. On
almost all of our operations
with countries that we've been
doing in the context of the
Rapid Credit Facility, we have
been asking the authorities
to, number one, explain what
the resources are being used
to. And then, number
two, use their institutions,
and if their institutions are
not strong enough, external
auditors, to show that those
resources have been used for
the intended purpose. I
think already, you know -- and
also, sorry a third element of
this is that beneficiary
owners of the companies that
are being awarded contracts
are
published.
So already, you know,
yesterday there was some
reporting, if you look at the
staff report on Cameroon, on
the, you know, on how the
resources from the first
disbursement were used.
And also, of course, you know,
the beneficial owners of
companies for those
benefits. So, there's
already some reporting.
And this is something that we
are working diligently to get
into the public
information.
We strongly, strongly believe
that not only is governance
important, you know, for
countries benefit, but also,
what we can do is bring about
a lot of transparency in terms
of how resources are
used. This is a core
function that we do through
our work in helping certain
countries public finance
management systems, but at
times like this, I think when
resources are being provided
quickly. It's really
important also that, you know,
there is transparency in how
these resources are being
used.
We want this information to be
in the public domain so that
civil society organizations,
anti-corruption agencies can
all scrutinize how these
resources are being used and
this is an area of what we are
very, very diligently,
following on. And that's
our contribution to making
sure that that there continues
to be improved
governance.
SELASSIE:
So, on Côte d'Ivoire you know,
the WAEMU region more broadly
has seen even within the
African context of limited
infection levels the WAEMU
overall has seen even lower,
you know, at the lower end of
infection rates. So, in
terms of the direct infection
numbers, even controlling for
testing being low, it seems
that the number of COVID cases
has remained low. So
that is very encouraging, and
we've also seen overall in the
WAEMU fairly strong economic,
somewhat stronger economic
outcomes than elsewhere in the
region. On account of a
bit more diversified economic
structures that countries
have. But again, you
know, even there, we are
looking at very anemic or even
negative real per capita
growth rates, including in
Côte d'Ivoire. So, the
conditions have remained
fairly weak and they continue
to you know, much of what I
was saying earlier, the policy
challenges remain as
challenging as elsewhere.
Earlier in
the week, Inner City Press
asked the IMF: "What is the
IMF's assessment of the
turmoil in Kyrgyz Republic?
Can or will the IMF to do
anything to assist, including
on continued COVID-19 response
as well as debt to China /
Eximbank?"
His answer,
interim video here,
recounted the IMF's
pre-turmoil assistance to
Kyrgyzstan. here.
Inner City
Press also asked, "On Yemen,
what is the status of the use
of the new riyal banknotes
printed by the Central Bank in
Yemen, and any actions taken
by the IMF?" and, when called
on by video for a follow-up,
about the Nagorno Karabakh
conflict between Azerbaijan
and Armenia. Video on
YouTube here.
On the
latter, Jihad Azour cited the
IMF's Technical Assistant center
set for Almaty, Kazakhstan
and said the IMF joins in
calls for a ceasefire (which
have been mouthed by but not
followed up on by the
UNresponsive UN). We'll have
more on this.
***
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