Lungu Claims He will Not ‘Borrow Recklessly’ despite overseeing debt increase to $15.95 Billion in just four years.

President Edgar Lungu has left his critics confused by claiming the government will ‘not borrow recklessly’ to finance the country’s transformation and development process.

In a laughable speech he continued to claim that his administration remained ‘committed to prudent borrowing.’

This comes from the man and PF government that have oven seen the most rapid growth of domestic and international debt that many Zambians have ever seen.

Before Christmas the PF was having to put out fires across international media and business when it came out that the country was in fact heading straight into a debt crisis. Over the past 6 years, oh which Lungu has been President for four, the country has issued $81 billion in dollar bonds to investors.

On top of this has been an incredibly murky syndicate of loans and bilateral debts, most of which went to China and are tied in with large scale construction projects under the guise of ‘development.’

By the end of 2019, Zambia’s public debt stood at $14.56 billion, representing 53.1% of GDP against a threshold of 56%. Arrears stood at around K13.9 billion, in total we went into 2019 with an estimated US$15.95 billion. This number stood at just $3.5 billion before the PF came into power. Under President Lungu it has increased by a staggering $6.26 billion.

Adding insult to injury, today he also assured donors that the government would not condone the misuse of donor funds that were earmarked for the welfare of vulnerable Zambians.  Just months ago, it was in fact discovered that money had been siphoned off cash transfer schemes by government officials, this led to the UK and Sweden cutting funding.

His speech today at the Diplomatic Corp meeting at State House has done nothing but highlight his hypocrisy and ignorance so how grave the current financial situation is in Zambia.