Le pret angolais jette la lumière sur les liens avec la Chine
A l'heure ou les millairds chinois font danser les Congolais (les vivants et les morts), un coup d'oeil a un precedent de l'empire du milieux en Angola pourra faire reflechir (pour ceux qui n'ont pas encore perdu cette faculte).
-------------
Angolan loan casts light on ties with China
Angola has admitted that one of the loans that have formed a pillar of its strong commercial ties with China amounted to less than a third of what had been previously thought.
In a rare statement on the subject, the Angolan Finance Ministry said on Thursday the 2005 line of credit from the Hong-Kong-based China International Fund (CIF) was worth $2.9bn (£1.4bn, €2bn) rather than the $9.8bn figure quoted by the World Bank, which was based on government statistics.
The statement was issued after a senior government official, Aguinaldo Jaime, who runs Angola’s economic policy, had hinted in an interview with the Financial Times that the CIF loan had run into difficulties.
His remarks were seized on by World Bank officials and diplomats who have long been seeking to see through the secrecy cast by Luanda and Beijing over the two countries’ ties.
They fuelled speculation in Luanda that the recent suspension of some Chinese-funded projects in Angola was due to problems with the CIF loan. They also reinforced the theory of many analysts that the official figures quoted for China’s support to Africa were often very unreliable.
Chris Alden, the head of a new “China in Africa” project at Johannesburg’s South Africa Institute of International Affairs and author of a book on the relationship, said: “Basically the figures both out of China and Africa are fairly suspect. We China-watchers are far too reliant on government-published figures but they have no comparative basis. Often statistics are cobbled together from leaks.”
The CIF is the construction arm of Beiya International Development, which imports oil from Angola to China. It has won a range of construction projects in Angola as the government rebuilds infrastructure devastated in the 27-year on-off civil war that ended in 2002.
But diplomats and aid workers say work on many of these projects has ground to a halt, intensifying suspicions that the construction companies hired by the CIF have not been paid.
Thursday’s statement also clarified confusion over another set of Chinese loans to Angola, via China’s Exim Bank. The finance ministry said they were worth $4bn.
The Angolan government has long refused to comment on the CIF loan. It is controlled by the Cabinet of National Reconstruction, headed by a general close to President José Eduardo dos Santos, who has ruled since 1979. Human rights groups accuse the cabinet of misusing some of the funds and call for greater transparency in their disbursement.
Mr Jaime, a leading reformist, distanced himself from the arrangements. “It’s not managed by me,” he said. “It’s managed by other administrative entities. It’s concessional lending and some of the loans are not supposed to be repaid so I don’t have exact figures.” The CIF loan was not “fully commercial”, he said. “It’s more political. Some of it is not to be repaid. It’s highly political, probably dealt with at the highest level.”
The CIF told the FT the appropriate person was not available to comment on the size of the loan or on the progress of the projects.
Representatives of the CIF can be seen driving around Luanda in branded vehicles. Its website includes a range of Angolan projects, including rebuilding the Benguela railway, which when completed will open up southern Africa. But its relationship with the government and its financing are opaque.
“I’d like to know how much was lent?” said one senior western diplomat. “How much was disbursed? And what are the terms of the loan?”
Lucy Corkin, an expert on Angola’s relationship with China from the University of Stellenbosch’s Centre for Chinese Studies, said the saga was a reminder of the complexity of China’s links with Africa.
“There are various different actors and parallel structures in terms of China’s financing in Angola,” she said. “The fact that they [CIF] are collaborating with the cabinet [of national reconstruction] means they have access at a very high level. They are very visible in Luanda, but there is no real clarity as to the extent of their operations.”
By Alec Russell (October 19 2007), The Financial Times Limited 2007
Angola has admitted that one of the loans that have formed a pillar of its strong commercial ties with China amounted to less than a third of what had been previously thought.
In a rare statement on the subject, the Angolan Finance Ministry said on Thursday the 2005 line of credit from the Hong-Kong-based China International Fund (CIF) was worth $2.9bn (£1.4bn, €2bn) rather than the $9.8bn figure quoted by the World Bank, which was based on government statistics.
The statement was issued after a senior government official, Aguinaldo Jaime, who runs Angola’s economic policy, had hinted in an interview with the Financial Times that the CIF loan had run into difficulties.
His remarks were seized on by World Bank officials and diplomats who have long been seeking to see through the secrecy cast by Luanda and Beijing over the two countries’ ties.
They fuelled speculation in Luanda that the recent suspension of some Chinese-funded projects in Angola was due to problems with the CIF loan. They also reinforced the theory of many analysts that the official figures quoted for China’s support to Africa were often very unreliable.
Chris Alden, the head of a new “China in Africa” project at Johannesburg’s South Africa Institute of International Affairs and author of a book on the relationship, said: “Basically the figures both out of China and Africa are fairly suspect. We China-watchers are far too reliant on government-published figures but they have no comparative basis. Often statistics are cobbled together from leaks.”
The CIF is the construction arm of Beiya International Development, which imports oil from Angola to China. It has won a range of construction projects in Angola as the government rebuilds infrastructure devastated in the 27-year on-off civil war that ended in 2002.
But diplomats and aid workers say work on many of these projects has ground to a halt, intensifying suspicions that the construction companies hired by the CIF have not been paid.
Thursday’s statement also clarified confusion over another set of Chinese loans to Angola, via China’s Exim Bank. The finance ministry said they were worth $4bn.
The Angolan government has long refused to comment on the CIF loan. It is controlled by the Cabinet of National Reconstruction, headed by a general close to President José Eduardo dos Santos, who has ruled since 1979. Human rights groups accuse the cabinet of misusing some of the funds and call for greater transparency in their disbursement.
Mr Jaime, a leading reformist, distanced himself from the arrangements. “It’s not managed by me,” he said. “It’s managed by other administrative entities. It’s concessional lending and some of the loans are not supposed to be repaid so I don’t have exact figures.” The CIF loan was not “fully commercial”, he said. “It’s more political. Some of it is not to be repaid. It’s highly political, probably dealt with at the highest level.”
The CIF told the FT the appropriate person was not available to comment on the size of the loan or on the progress of the projects.
Representatives of the CIF can be seen driving around Luanda in branded vehicles. Its website includes a range of Angolan projects, including rebuilding the Benguela railway, which when completed will open up southern Africa. But its relationship with the government and its financing are opaque.
“I’d like to know how much was lent?” said one senior western diplomat. “How much was disbursed? And what are the terms of the loan?”
Lucy Corkin, an expert on Angola’s relationship with China from the University of Stellenbosch’s Centre for Chinese Studies, said the saga was a reminder of the complexity of China’s links with Africa.
“There are various different actors and parallel structures in terms of China’s financing in Angola,” she said. “The fact that they [CIF] are collaborating with the cabinet [of national reconstruction] means they have access at a very high level. They are very visible in Luanda, but there is no real clarity as to the extent of their operations.”
By Alec Russell (October 19 2007), The Financial Times Limited 2007
posted by maswana @ 6:05 AM
1 comments
