Angola: Government confirms net foreign reserves were $15bn in September 2017

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Angola: Government confirms net foreign reserves were $15bn in September 2017

1:20 CAT | 30 Nov 2018

The minister of state for economic and social development, Manuel Nunes Júnior, presented an update of the government’s macroeconomic stabilisation programme (PEM), whose data confirms what the former president said on 21 November in response to public comments by his successor, João Lourenço, who said that the state coffers were empty when he took over in September 2017. Photo: Lusa

Angola’s government confirmed on Thursday that in September 2017 the state had the equivalent of $15 billion dollars in net international reserves, as previously said by the former president, José Eduardo dos Santos.

At a news conference held in Luanda at which the presence of foreign media outlets was not authorised and during which dos Santos’s name was never mentioned, the minister of state for economic and social development, Manuel Nunes Júnior, presented an update of the government’s macroeconomic stabilisation programme (PEM), whose data confirms what the former president said on 21 November in response to public comments by his successor, João Lourenço , who said that the state coffers were empty when he took over in September 2017.

“Given that domestic consumption in the country remains very dependent on imports, Angola recorded, between 2014 and 2017, successive deficits on its current account and balance of payments, with negative effects on the [net international reserves], which went from about 27.2 billion dollars in 2014 to about 15 billion dollars in 2017,” said Manuel Nunes Júnior, according to the broadcast of the news conference broadcast live by Angolan media. “That means that in a three-year period [under dos Santos], the country no longer had available about 12 billion dollars in the net international reserves.”

Dos Santos had stated that he did not “leave the state vaults empty” and that in September 2017, when he stepped down, “I left 15 billion dollars in the National Bank of Angola as net international reserves in the hands of a manager who was the governor of the [National Bank of Angola] under the guidance of the government.”

At Thursday’s news conference, Nunes Júnior began by stating that in September 2017, the treasury had in its possession $6.98 billion “in foreign currency”, when three years earlier the amount was $15.86 billion.

“Since Angola’s revenues are very dependent on external resources, it should be noted that, in 2013, the treasury’s single account in foreign currency was 15.86 billion dollars,” he said. “In September 2017, this account reached the lowest amounts of recent years, standing at 6.98 billion dollars.”

“The tax authorities had to face a situation that evidenced high public indebtedness in the face of weak resources in the national treasury,” he added.

Source: Lusa