FOREIGN DEBT and the ECONOMICS
of the EGYPTIAN COUNTER-REVOLUTION.
INTRODUCTION By Hugo Adan. Enero 10, 2014
En dos anteriores artículos indicábamos que hay
dos barreras grandes que impiden el avance de la rev popular Egipcia, el
fundamentalismo neoliberal y el religioso. El 1ro obliga a la sumisión económica
a las reglas que se establecieron en el Washignton Consensus de 1985, lo que
solo beneficia a los grandes banqueros y las grandes corporaciones de los
imperios del norte. Libertad económica solo existe para ellos (lo documenté en
varios artículos de esta web ( http://nd-hugoadan.blogspot.com/
) el resto tiene que pagarles tributos y eso opera a través del control del dólar
y de la deuda externa.
De otro lado, el fundamentalismo religioso solo
ha servido para entronizar en el poder
local a jeques y reyesuelos que usan la fe del pueblo para encebar sus panzas con
el uso privado de riquezas naturales que pertenecen a toda la nación. En nombre de ambos fundamentalismos se han
cometido y se siguen cometiendo los más horribles crímenes contra la humanidad. Si ambos fundamentalismos
aún están vigentes es porque se apoyan
en estructuras y aparatos institucionales que la revolución egipcia fue incapaz de afectar.
Morsi se acomodó en ellas, se puso la bota
militar para aplastar las demandas
popular con una horrenda masacre jamás vista en la historia Egipcia. Encima de las botas se puso los calcetines de
democracia y los velos de la charria
para arrebatarle al pueblo su revolución. Fue Morsi quien inicio la
contra-revolucion económica en Egipto y aquí
vamos a documentarlo con un artículo introductorio que muestra que el pueblo
Egipcio exigió auditoria en lugar de los corruptos swaps. Esa demanda no se respetó,
al contrario se la aplastó en forma bruta. En otros artículos que adjunto se indica que
la lucha continuó y aún continúa. Ver RELATED ARTICLES.
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Egypt. DEBT SWAP IS NOT AN ALTERNATIVE TO
CANCELLING ODIOUS DEBT Statement of the Popular Campaign to Drop Egypt’s Debt. 17 February 2012
by Popular Campaign to Drop Egypt’s Debt http://cadtm.org/Egypt-Debt-Swap-is-not-an
Background
Amidst a general atmosphere of an
extreme lack of transparency it has come to our knowledge that Egypt had sealed
agreements with three European countries pertaining to the implementation of
debt swap programs, and is currently negotiating with two further countries.
The countries in question according to informal sources are Germany, France,
Italy and Belgium. The Popular Campaign to Drop Egypt’s Debt would like to
raise strong concerns regarding the conditions under which these agreement are
being negotiated, as well as the practice of debt swap itself under the given
circumstances. In
the current phase our campaign opposes in principle dealing with Egypt’s
foreign debt through debt swap initiatives, as this diverges from the main aim
of auditing previous debt, especially that contracted during the Mubarak
dictatorship. And since there is considerable consensus amongst a
wide group of Members of the European Parliament to suspend payments and
conduct an audit to countries going through democratization processes as,
stated in the ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly Resolution |1|, we would like to elaborate more on our
concerns.
Lack of transparency and
participation
Undoubtedly, whatever the final
political or economic position is of any debt swap agreements, they show from
the very beginning a lack of transparency, as is the case with all activities
related to borrowing from abroad in specific, and from government finances in
general. The degree of secrecy this time has reached the situation where the
government made no public statements, nor informed any media outlets about the
details of the debt swap agreements. It is through informal connections that
the campaign was able to obtain any information whatsoever. If the current
government sees some gain in a debt swap, and a sort of external help for
Egypt, then it is imperative to disclose the details of these agreements and
declare the alleged achievements with civil society and the Egyptian public at
large.
Campaign’s position on the procedure
of debt swap
Furthermore, aside from the lack of
transparency in procedures, and any kind of popular or parliamentary political
participation, swapping
debt does not represent in any manner an alternative to auditing and cancelling
foreign odious debts. The reason is that debt swap is based on one
country forfeiting its right to a debt or part of such in return of the indebted
government’s vow to direct the amounts to investment projects to be agreed upon
with the lending country.
However, whereas debt swap achieves
initial gains in terms of a) saving the cost of servicing the debt, as well as
b) transforming foreign debts to investments, there would be no guarantee that
these projects align with indebted states’ plans for development. On the
contrary such
projects often constitute some sort of constraint or conditionality.
In this light, setting the nature and value of the projects and the expected
returns is another issue that needs to be investigated, to ensure that debt swap does not
further burden the indebted country – Egypt- with more liabilities than those
of the original debt. In all cases, the details of the agreement
should be disclosed, along with the standards upon which the projects were
agreed upon.
Debt swap and odious debt
Most importantly, debt swap
agreements do not represent in any manner an alternative to auditing and
dropping foreign debt that are proven to be illegal or illegitimate.
This is true in the case where loans are made without true political
representation of a population. Furthermore, loans or debt swaps are considered illegitimate or
odious when the creditor is aware that the borrowing government is not subject
to any real supervision, which would allow for a guarantee of a sound spending
of the funds, or that this government is oppressive of its population.
Unfortunately, those conditions stated above have
manifested during Mubarak’s dictatorship, thus bringing urgent rise to conduct
an extensive debt audit of the foreign debt incurred under the
Mubarak regime. Therefore, The Popular Campaign to Drop Egypt’s Debts will
continue to search and examine the external debt register, although it further
demands the disclosure of the details related to debt swap agreements. The
members of the campaign are strongly disappointed all reports of the corruption
of the Mubarak regime have not translated into an examination of the
accumulated external and internal debts during the extended years of his rule. The disregard of
such a matter occurred, in spite of the disclosure on the part of official
parliamentary or judicial parties of the corruption in the external debt file.
Respect for the sovereignty of the
Egyptian people
One aim of this exercise is to send
a clear message to future governments, that contracting new debt without transparency and
accountability is no longer acceptable. After the Arab Spring, the people
demand from both their own government and creditors to respect the fundamental
sovereignty of the Egyptian people with regards to economic decision-making.
Transitional governments should not
formulate Egypt’s long-term policies
The campaign believes, that the government’s
continuous tendency to swap debts instead of reviewing and abstaining from
payment of whatever is proven to be illegal, or odious, is an attempt to avoid
the responsibility for past misconduct carry out at in the name of the Egyptian
people. This is not unexpected since most members of the current
economic decision making team remain in the same positions they held during the
previous regime. Furthermore, we find it entirely unacceptable that a
‘transitional’ government is overstepping its jurisdiction and is negotiating
agreements with foreign governments, the implications of which determine the
economic future of Egypt.
For all the reasons
mentioned in this letter we herewith call upon all foreign governments to: 1-
abstain from negotiating with any unelected transitional government; 2- allow
for the auditing of all unilateral debt incurred by the Egyptian dictatorship
and; 3- to ensure all future
negotiations are transparent and take place with a legitimate partner that
represents the Egyptian population.
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Excerpt from our founding
statement |2|
2) As a general rule, the campaign disapproves of
debt swap mechanisms. Debt swaps create new debt burdens, whose legality
and benefit are not checked by the people. In cases where debt swaps are used
instead of audit and cancellation, the campaign adopts the following stands:
- Debt agreements should be reviewed to determine the legitimacy of the swapped debts.
- The conditions of debt swap should be discussed in a manner that guarantees integrity and transparency in the decision-making process
Footnotes
|1| ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly
Resolution; reference: ACP-EU/100.958/11/ fin: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/intco...
|2| Founding Statement : http://www.cadtm.org/The-Popular-Ca...
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RELATED ARTICLES:
Open Call: Egyptian
Human Rights Organizations Oppressed 19 December 2013 - Egyptian Center for
Economic and Human Rights http://cadtm.org/Open-Call-Egyptian-Human-Rights
Egypt’s turmoil is a
distraction from IMF economic agenda 24 September 2012 - Nick Dearden http://cadtm.org/Egypt-s-turmoil-is-a-distraction
Egypt. ’No’ to
borrowing on the terms of the IMF, Ganzouri and their successors 13 September
2012 - Wael Gamal. http://cadtm.org/Egypt-No-to-borrowing-on-the-terms
Hook: Egypt debt
repayments to UK and other Western governments, 29 June Egypt pays $650m
‘dictator debt’ to West 28 June 2012 - Jubilee Debt Campaign http://cadtm.org/Egypt-pays-650m-dictator-debt-to
The Popular Campaign
to Drop Egypt’s Debt Call to European national MPs and MEPs: To demand from the
Egyptian government an audit of Egypt’s debts to EU countries through an
independent committee 6 June 2012 http://cadtm.org/The-Popular-Campaign-to-Drop-Egypt,8049
Drop Egypt’s Debt letter
to IMF around Spring meetings requesting transparency! 28 April 2012 - Popular
Campaign to Drop Egypt’s Debt. http://cadtm.org/Drop-Egypt-s-Debt-letter-to-IMF
Egypt’s economic
reform proposals ignore social justice: Civil group 2 April 2012 - Bassem Abo
Alabass
Press Release Egypt:
transitional government obtains loans four times as much as those of Mubarak’s
time 2 February 2012 - Amr Adly http://cadtm.org/Egypt-s-economic-reform-proposals
Egypt’s ’Orderly
Transition’? International Aid and the Rush to Structural Adjustement 3
December 2011 - Adam Hanieh http://cadtm.org/Egypt-transitional-government
“You Pay, You
Monitor” The Popular Campaign to Drop Egypt’s Debts 8 November 2011 - Popular
Campaign to Drop Egypt’s Debt. http://cadtm.org/The-Popular-Campaign-to-Drop-Egypt
Egypt to IMF: ‘Topple
their debts’ 8 November 2011 - Eric Walberg.
http://cadtm.org/Egypt-to-IMF-Topple-their-debts
What is a debt audit
and how might it work in Egypt 29 August 2011 - Nick Dearden http://cadtm.org/What-is-a-debt-audit-and-how-might
Debt, Dictatorship,
and Democratization 20 April 2011 - Robert Howse, Ruti Teitel http://cadtm.org/Debt-Dictatorship-and
Egypt’s debt must
fall with Mubarak’s regime 18 February 2011 - Nick Dearden http://cadtm.org/Egypt-s-debt-must-fall-with
The Arab revolution
is underway: after Tunisia, Egypt in turn ignites... 8 February 2011 - Jérome
Duval, Fathi Chamkhi http://cadtm.org/The-Arab-revolution-is-underway
DOCUMENTOS TEORICOS
1. CANCELLING DEBT OR TAXING CAPITAL: WHY SHOULD WE
CHOOSE?
November 2, 2013 by Eric
Toussaint , Patrick Saurin , Thomas Coutrot
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2. DEMANDS INCREASE FOR INTERNATIONAL MECHANISMS
TO PUNISH TRANSNATIONAL CORPORATIONS’ CRIMES .
International Peoples Treaty: “Defending peoples’ rights against
corporate power”. 5 December 2013 by
Stop corporate impunity http://cadtm.org/Demands-increase-for-international
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3. DEBT VERSUS DEMOCRACY: A BATTLE FOR THE FUTURE 23 January 2013 by Marisa Holmes . http://cadtm.org/Debt-Versus-Democracy-A-Battle-for
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