Africa-Press – Angola. The director general of the Angolan Debt Management Unit said this Monday, January 27, that the debt with China, Angola’s main creditor, has been on a downward trajectory and could be fully repaid in 2028.
Dorivaldo Teixeira, who today presented in Luanda the Angolan State’s Annual Debt Plan for 2025, gave a historical assessment of the public debt, recalling that the main creditor is China, representing (with debt collateralized with oil and not collateralized with oil), around 14.15 billion dollars (13.45 billion euros).
Regarding the domestic debt, he added that it is approximately the same size, at 14 billion dollars (13 billion euros), with the United Kingdom being one of the main creditors.
Regarding the debt with China, which reached more than 20 billion dollars (19 billion euros), he considered that it is currently “more manageable”, with the debt collateralized with oil being the one that causes the most concern.
As part of this debt, Angola supplies China with oil shipments that are monetized at market prices, with the resources from this financing being directed either towards debt servicing or towards the State’s financial activity.
“In March 2024, we managed to reach an agreement with one of the largest creditors that allowed us to slightly change the operating mechanics of this agreement, allowing Angola to release extraordinary resources from its escrow accounts” (an account that acts as a guarantee or bail in commercial transactions), he recalled.
“In other words, these are extra resources that will come in and allow us to leverage our activity”, highlighted the general director of the Angolan Debt Management Unit (UGD).
Dorivaldo Teixeira highlighted the downward trajectory of the debt stock with China, which in 2017 reached a level of around 23 billion dollars (21.8 billion euros) and has been decreasing.
“If we continue to be able to service this debt with the scale we have been servicing, we will probably be able to have this debt completely paid off by 2028,” he stressed.
In terms of debt service, in 2022, immediately after the debt suspension process, this went from the threshold of 14 billion dollars to 16 billion dollars (15.2 billion euros), a situation that, he explained, “caused Angola during these three years to have a lot of pressure through debt service”.
The debt stock also saw a significant improvement, rising from a threshold of 72 billion dollars (68.4 billion euros) to around 60 billion dollars (57 billion euros), he added, explaining that part of this was related to the reduction of internal and external debt and part to exchange rate variations, with more debt not indexed to the exchange rate.
“Conditions may be being created so that, in the medium term, with the stabilization of macroeconomic conditions, domestic securities can effectively serve as a reference for financing the economy”, that is, creating conditions for us to finance ourselves more in kwanzas, said the person in charge of the UGD.
For the treasury, the objective is to go to the international market and be able to issue 1.5 billion dollars.
“And we also count on financing from the World Bank, of around 500 million dollars, from the African Development Bank, of around 164 million dollars, and the remainder from commercial financing,” added Dorivaldo Teixeira.
ANGOLA24
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