The World Bank has approved a loan of around 500 million dollars to Angola to finance the General State Budget (GSB) for 2024 and 2025. This was revealed by the Minister of Planning, Victor Hugo Guilherme, who led a ministerial delegation that took part in the annual meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
The Angolan Minister of Planning described the meetings of the World Bank (WB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which ended on Friday, as “fruitful”, as they made it possible to review Angola’s financing portfolio.
Victor Hugo Guilherme, the head of the portfolio, also stressed that the government is negotiating further funding with the World Bank to support the private business sector in various areas.
“We are working with the World Bank. We’ve reviewed our portfolio, we’ve posed some challenges to the World Bank, in the sense of increasing the support portfolio for the country, financing more projects, but this doesn’t mean that the state is going to go into more debt either. We are asking for more projects to be financed, but aimed at the private sector, because we think that the private sector’s contribution to our banking sector is insufficient and the World Bank could be the way to strengthen this support for the private sector in various areas,” said the minister.
According to the minister, in a month’s time, the World Bank will make around 500 million dollars available to Angola, to reinforce the General State Budget (GSB) for 2024 and 2025.
“We have prioritized the area of food security, with budget support. It’s around 500 million dollars, for us to finance the actions that are in the 2024 State Budget, perhaps also for 2025. The financing conditions are very advantageous: ten years for free, low interest rates and payment over 30 years,” announced Victor Hugo Guilherme.
The Angolan delegation to the WB and IMF annual meetings included Finance Minister Vera Daves de Sousa, the governor of the National Bank of Angola (BNA), Tiago Dias, as well as the president of the Angolan Sovereign Fund, Armando Manuel.
