• Creditors to Zambia need not worry about current financial position.
• Before extending a request for help, Zambians ought to assist themselves.
• The Chinese are aware that if the economy is not reorganized, their own debt stock is at risk.

President Hakainde Hichilema has urged creditors to Zambia not to worry about the country’s current financial position.
President Hichilema said his government will arrive at an amicable and mutually beneficial solution.
“Creditors to Zambia need not worry about our current financial position. We will arrive at an amicable and mutually beneficial solution to our debt. We will engage transparently and in good faith,” President Hichilema twitted.
And speaking when he featured on BBC’s Focus on Africa last evening, the Head of State indicated that government has inherited a country whose coffers are empty, as the debt situation was not fully disclosed by the previous regime.
He said before extending a request for help, Zambians ought to assist themselves by understanding the country’s resources are scarce hence the need to ensure prudent utilization.
“We inherited the extremely difficult situation a very bad situation, we knew that the economy will be socially, economically bad but always much bigger than we expected, and we are just digging in now for example, the debt position itself was not fully disclosed and we are picking issues around that but we will be on top of things very soon in terms of knowing the extent of the damage that has been done, there is a lot of damage. We are talking about the full extent of the debt,” he said.
The Head of State added that Zambia is not concerned about International Monetary Fund (IMF)’s conditions for a possible bailout package because the country’s bond minimum requirements are much higher than what the Fund wants.
“Before we can extend a request to anybody to assist us we must help ourselves. We are not concerned about the IMF conditionality our bond minimum requirements are much higher than what the IMF wants, and I think that’s what the people of Zambia need, they need zero tolerance to corruption and we are bringing that to them,” he stated.
Meanwhile, President Hichilema disclosed that that government has commenced talks with China to find possible ways of stabilizing the economy.
He explained that government wants to develop the country’s resource endowment so as to grow the economy and make it credible to do business with anyone in the world.
“We are aware of the Chinese debt portfolio and the Chinese are aware that if the economy is not reorganized to bring about growth, their own debt stock is at risk. They understand that we need to talk, we are talking, we have started the initial stage, they have indicated that they will cooperate and I think we are able to do things with them that will help this economy stabilize.”
Yesterday, Bank of Zambia Governor Christopher Mvunga disclosed during the Bank’s quarterly media briefing that the at the end of August 2021, foreign reserves rose to about US$2.9 billion equivalent to 5.4 months of import cover following the receipt of Special Drawing Rights (SDR) allocation of US$1.3 billion from IMF as well as market purchases.