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Gambia News: D11.64 Million Debt Cancelled
The Paris-Club Creditor Countries Cancelled U S 11.64 Million Of US $40 MillionOwed To Them As Their Share Of The Debt Relief Granted The Gambia Within The Framework Of The Enhanced Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative, a press release issued by the Department of State for Finance indicates.
According tothe release, following the Declaration by the Boards of the IMF and the WorldBank, in December, 2007, that The Gambia reached its Completion Point under theEnhanced Heavily Indebted Poor countries (HIPC) Initiative and became eligiblefor debt relief under the scheme and the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative(MDRI ), The Gambia Government and representatives of the Governments ofAustria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway andThe United Kingdom referred to as "Participating Paris Club creditor countries"met on 24 January, 2008 in order to finalize cancellation of the Paris Club'sshare of the debt relief within the framework of the enhanced HIPC initiative,as calculated in the Completion point report.
The release confirmed as follows:
1) Thestock of debt due to Paris Club creditor by the Republic of The Gambia wasestimated to be around U$$ 40 million as of 1' December 2007.
In order tocontribute to restore the debt sustainability of the Republic of The Gambia,participating Paris-Club creditor countries decided to cancel U$$ 11.64million, [On all loans signed and disbursed from their group of creditorsbefore July, 1986] in its entirety and part of the post-cut off date debt-,(i.e. loans signed and disbursed after the cut-off date July, 1986) were also,cancelled and forgiven. Bilateral agreements with the affected Paris Club creditorcountries are to be signed by end June 2008 to operationalise this Paris Club Agreement.In the agreements concluded, Austria will provide Naple's Terms treatment bycancelling 86% of debt servicing flow and the remaining 14% to be paid on duedates. However, Franceexcludes loans to Gamtel and GRTS from its debt relief treatment and therecently signed Loans for the Global Maritime Disaster and Safety SystemProject from Belgium and theGreater Banjul Water Supply Project from ING, Netherlands are also excluded fromdebt relief treatment.
2) The Republic of The Gambia is committed to allocate theresources freed by this debt treatment to priority areas identified in thecountry's poverty reduction strategy. The authorities of the Republic of The Gambiaare committed also to seek comparable treatment from all their other externalcreditors."
The Gambian delegation was led by the Secretary of State for Finance and Economic Affairs.
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