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Developing country debt payments increase by 60% in three years

22 March 2018 - by Jubilee Debt Campaign

Figures released today by the Jubilee Debt Campaign, based on IMF and World Bank databases, show that developing country debt payments increased by 60% between 2014 and 2017. They are now at the highest level since 2004. Government external (...)
The Fate of the Revolution

22 February 2018 - by Nathan Legrand

Tunisia’s ruling class is pursuing the same economic policies as the authoritarian regime it replaced. In the first half of January, a wave of protests spread across Tunisia. Most observers say that the new finance law, implemented at the (...)
Occupation and genocide disguised as “discovery”

18 December 2017 - by Jérôme Duval

“We have been told, and still are, that it was the pilgrims of the Mayflower that populated America. Had it been empty before?” Eduardo Galeano. "What was really discovered [in 1492] is what Spain really was, the reality of Western culture and (...)
The case for repudiation of Uganda’s public debt

8 December 2017 - by Mary Serumaga

Uganda is in imminent danger of defaulting on its debt repayment obligations. The Auditor General notes in 2017 that interest payments on the public debt exceeded legal limits (15% of the annual budget) and are likely to be unsustainable going (...)
Hunger, Foreign Debt and Uganda’s Fairytale Budgets

29 November 2017 - by Mary Serumaga

An abiding image of Uganda in April 2017 is of a group of elderly people squatting around an anthill, men and women, patting it with bunches of greenery to coax the termites out. They then pluck up the termites and eat them, not as the seasonal (...)
Zimbabwe witnessing an elite transition as economic meltdown looms

20 November 2017 - by Patrick Bond

In Harare, Bulawayo and smaller Zimbabwean cities, hundreds of thousands of citizens joyfully of Robert Mugabe at the age of 93. Initially refusing to resign, his rambling speech the following evening revealed a man either out of touch with (...)
Brazil: the debt dilemma

16 November 2017 - by Michael Roberts

Brazil faces a presidential election in October 2018. This will offer a new benchmark for which way Brazilian politics and the economy will go. Will a coalition of pro-big business parties and a president win or will a coalition led by the (...)
A legacy of liberalisation in Sri Lanka

4 October 2017 - by Balasingham Skanthakumar

The Sri Lankan government recently released its ‘Vision 2025’ manifesto, heralding a new wave of economic reforms. Its timing coincided with the 40th anniversary of the island’s embrace of deregulation, trade liberalisation, and privatisation ahead (...)
‘Africa Rising’ in retreat: Signs of new resistances

29 September 2017 - by Patrick Bond

Capitalism is bleeding Africa to death: illegal financial flows, legal financial outflows, FDI flows, foreign indebtedness, sub-imperial accumulation, new subsidies for infrastructure financing and uncompensated mineral and oil and gas (...)
Demand debt relief for hurricane-hit islands

25 September 2017 - by Jubilee Debt Campaign

A petition to all creditors, including the IMF and World Bank Over recent weeks, several countries in the Caribbean have been devastated by hurricanes. Some of those countries were already heavily indebted, often in part because of loans taken (...)
The dark side of infrastructure investment in Africa

12 June 2017 - by Collective

With its Compact with Africa the German G20 presidency is actively promoting private loans and investment as solutions to infrastructure deficiencies on the African continent. The Compact aims at using public resources in order to improve the (...)
Egypt’s debt trap: The neoliberal roots of the problem

5 June 2017 - by Mohammed Mossallem

Table of Contents I. Introduction II. The Causes Behind the Debt Crisis in the 1980s III. Post Debt Crisis: The Golden Opportunity Squandered Debt Implications of The Policies Adopted IV. Falling back into the debt trap: 2000-2011 (...)
Beware of the dragon bearing gifts – Chinese loans and investments in the Philippines

1 June 2017 - by Randy David

Following President Duterte’s state visit to China in October 2016, 27 deals have been signed with Chinese state entities and business corporations covering around US$9 billion in loans and US$15 billion in investments. The President proudly (...)
50 years of ADB : Debt, Destitution, Destruction, Disparity, & Displacement

30 May 2017 - by Sushovan Dhar, Ratan Bhandari, Hasan Mehdi

The Manila based Asian Development Bank (ADB) celebrated its 50th year at Yokohama from May 3-7, 2017 with a great display of extravagance and grandeur. Japan’s Crown Prince, Naruhito while inaugurating the 50th annual meeting emphasised on ADB’s (...)
ADB in Bangladesh: More Than Four Decades of Pillage & Devastation

8 May 2017 - by Hasan Mehdi

The ADB was established in 1966 at the initiative of UN’s Economic and Social Commission for Asia and Pacific (ESCAP). Two years after the great liberation war of 1971, it started working in Bangladesh. Since then (till 2016) Asian Development (...)
When France Used the Public Debt to Colonise Morocco

17 February 2017 - by Adam Barbe

It is now widely recognised that the French protectorate over Morocco was acquired thanks to that country’s public debt. Guy de Maupassant in Bel Ami (1885) alludes to this possibility twenty years before the event! Yet still today many (...)
The Mozambican debt crisis: How a sovereign state was sold

9 February 2017 - by Mary Serumaga

In 2013 Mozambican government officials formed three private companies and took out illegal secret loans totaling $2 billion. Donors suspended credit to Mozambique because of the loans as the national currency fell by 70% in 2016. Restructuring (...)
Mozambique defaults on its debt

3 February 2017 - by Jubilee Debt Campaign

Mozambique’s secret loans crisis has entered a new phase after the government missed a payment on its debts. Can you take action now in solidarity with campaigners in Mozambique? The country was thrown into crisis last year by the revelation (...)
Tunisia: 6 years after a quasi-revolution, a never-ending interregnum

18 January 2017 - by Fausto Giudice

6 years is nothing when you are 90 years old. But for people aged between 20 and 30, it is a very long time. Six years ago, the Tunisian people witnessed the escape of a petty dictator, whose evacuation to a golden exile in the shadow of the (...)
South Africa’s Junk Credit Rating was Avoided, But at the Cost of Junk Analysis

15 December 2016 - by Patrick Bond

Standard&Poors (S&P) gave South Africa a fearful few hours of anticipation last Friday, just after dust from the political windstorm of the prior week settled. The agency downgraded the government’s securities that are denominated in the (...)
Blind borrowing – Is Pakistan fast slipping into a debt trap?

8 December 2016 - by Dr. Kamal Monnoo

Owing to slowdown in exports and provided external borrowing are not capped, Pakistan’s external debt to export ratio is projected to be at 442% by 2019-20, which obviously will make it unserviceable. Exports, which used to finance 80% of imports (...)
Fidel Castro: The debt is unpayable

29 November 2016 - by Fidel Castro Ruz

This is the transcription of a speech by President Fidel Castro, at the Continental Dialogue on the Foreign Debt held at Havana’s Palace of Conventions on august 3rd, 1985. Introduction to Fidel Castro’s Speech, by Eric Toussaint In 1985, (...)
The fall and rise of Ghana’s debt: How a new debt trap has been set

19 October 2016 - by Jubilee Debt Campaign

Ghana is in a debt crisis. Having had significant amounts of debt cancelled a decade ago, the country is losing around 30% of government revenue in external debt payments each year. Ghana’s crisis is the result of a gradual increase in lending (...)
New discussion paper shows how IFIs and donors continue to influence economic policies in developing countries

12 October 2016 - by Tiago Stichelmans

Eleven years ago, the international community adopted the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness that led to the adoption of several principles to improve the effectiveness of international aid. Reflecting on the widely criticised fact that (...)
Part 1 of the interview “History of the CADTM’s anti- debt Policies"

The history of the CADTM and its struggle against illegitimate debt: Origins

2 August 2016 - by Eric Toussaint, Benjamin Lemoine

Interview with Eric Toussaint, spokesperson and co-founder of the international network of the Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt (CADTM). Interview by Benjamin Lemoine. This interview presents the genealogy of the anti-debt (...)