ANGOLA: Deciding to go it alone

Photo: Angop

President dos Santos called for intensified efforts to secure bilateral aid

LUANDA, 18 February 2005 (IRIN) - Angola will not be held to ransom by unjust conditions attached to international community support, President Jose Eduardo dos Santos said in a speech on Friday. In a major snub to global financial institutions, including the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Dos Santos said Angola would simply intensify its efforts to secure bilateral and private funding for its post-war reconstruction and development. In a speech to the Central Committee of the ruling MPLA party, the president bemoaned the fact that, despite two years of intense diplomatic relations, the international community still appeared unwilling to back a donor conference - seen as key to securing funds for the country's post-war development. "The countries most influential in this community have until today hesitated and placed unjust political and economic conditions on such a conference," Dos Santos said. The president's comments reinforced those made by Finance Minister Jose Pedro de Morais, who earlier this week accused the donor community and global institutions of politicising an IMF agreement by setting unreasonable goals for financial and economic information, which Angola simply could not meet. Dos Santos went a step further, insisting that oil-rich Angola would not give in to those demands, and would instead rely on other sources of cash to fund its national reconstruction programme. "It is clear that we are not going to desist; we will continue in our diligence and we will, in the meantime, make a concerted effort to use bilateral cooperation and national and foreign private investment, with the view to mobilising resources for our reconstruction and development," he remarked. The prospect of an IMF Staff Monitored Programme (SMP) is looking increasingly remote, with the IMF putting off a mission to the country amid concerns over the whereabouts of a $600 million windfall from high oil prices in 2004. The SMP is seen as pivotal to Angola's development by donors, who want the country to open up its books to scrutiny, and meet the standards demanded by global institutions to be able to secure cheaper credit on more favourable terms. Although Angola is one of the continent's richest countries in terms of natural resources, its people are among the poorest.