Since President Macky Sall asked for the cancellation of the debt (as well as the Heads of State of the
CEMAC zone), a good number of economists came out to talk about the issue of
indebtedness. Although the questions they raise are relevant, the current context should
to postpone the debate on this issue which, with regard to the literature, does not date from today. AT
my humble opinion, the question that arises in this context of Covid-19 is whether it is legitimate or not
to request the cancellation of the debt; or are the countries of the North obliged to cancel our
public debt.
To answer this question, let's go back to President Macron's opinion this week in the airwaves of
RFI: “When we look at how all the developed economies have responded to the crisis, we have made two
things: a monetary policy shock and a fiscal policy shock. Central banks, the
Bank of England, the FED, the ECB, had a massive monetary policy in March, without
precedent in terms of speed and magnitude. And then, a budgetary response, which the
governments are taking. In this context, there is no monetary equivalent on the
African continent, and this is a double penalty: there is no possibility of carrying out this monetary creation and this
movement precisely necessary for economies”. President Macron's admission is significant; he admits that
EU countries, like the United States, have monetized their debt through their central bank
respective and the Bank of England has set in motion a printing press (language translation of the
President Macron's "massive monetary policy") to deal with the impact of Covid-19. However, according to the
President Macron, we cannot use the same tool to do the same exercise. This to say
that, according to his argument, it is not with lightness of heart that he supports President Sall's announcement but
rather for reasons of moral logic. Only, in view of the relations between Africa and the
Westerners, from the time of slavery (through the wars) to the present day, the latter
owe us three times more than what they claim from us in debt. So this debt does not exist, we do not
owe absolutely nothing to Westerners; the request for cancellation of the debt and more than legitimate. About
of this legitimacy, we have read and approved the contribution of the actuary and financier CISSE ABDOU (*) on
the columns of Financial Afrik on March 30, 2020 for his article entitled: "France cannot refuse us
monetary practices that it has been implementing since 2015". In its press release of March 22, 2020, the
BCEAO accepts the issuance of treasury bonds called Covid-19 bonds; warrants with a maturity of three months,
issued on the regional financial market to meet the immediate expenses related to the fight against
Covid-19 pandemic. With the assistance of the Agence UMOA-Titres, it will proceed with the structuring and
programming of these broadcasts; a special window is opened by the BCEAO to allow banks
refinancing of these warrants from the day of issue or at the latest one month after acquisition for the
recent duration of the title.
Although the Central Bank's decision is a significant first step, we encourage it to go further
far to monetize our future public projects and completely get out of the vicious cycle of debt, as has
so well proposed Cissé Abdou (reference below).