Another African country has cleared its debt to the International Monetary Fund

Defence affairs - Def-Geopolitics

The Southern African country of Mozambique recently cleared its $701 million debt to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), according to Standard Bank, the largest bank in Africa.

This reimbursement entails that the country has cancelled an IMF mission intended for later this year, in August, despite no official details on the debt repayment from either Mozambique or the IMF.

In a research note dated March 27, Fáusio Mussá, chief economist at Standard Bank in Mozambique, disclosed that Mozambique had settled its debt to the global lender, citing information from the IMF itself.

This information seems consistent, as Mozambique’s outstanding debt on the IMF’s official portal reads zero.

As reported by Bloomberg, Mozambique’s debt prior to the recent settlement was a cause for concern.

The IMF in February had issued a warning to the Southern African country that its debt was in distress and on an unsustainable path.

In March, another prominent global lender, the World Bank, warned that the country’s current economic trajectory put $50 billion in gas projects at risk.

Mozambique's foreign exchange reserves, which stood at approximately $4.15 billion towards the end of January, were nearly at an all-time high.

Estimates from Standard Bank show that these reserves are expected to decrease to $3.5 billion following the country's debt repayment to the IMF, despite the ongoing accumulation of arrears with other bilateral and multilateral creditors.

Last year, a couple of African countries, including Nigeria and Namibia, cleared or at least reduced their outstanding debts to the IMF.

In May 2025, Nigeria repaid a $3.4 billion emergency loan borrowed from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) under the Rapid Financing Instrument (RFI), which was accessed in 2020 to cushion the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The IMF Resident Representative in Nigeria, Dr. Christian Ebeke, highlighted the fulfillment requirements for loan accounting under the Fund's Rapid Financing Instrument.

For Namibia, the Southern African country, in October of the same year, committed to a significant reduction of its debt obligations, amounting to $750 million.

Its IMF debt went from $71,662,500 in September to $47,775,000 the next month. The country’s current debt is $19,080,000, making it the second lowest in Africa currently.

The IMF data portal has 45 African countries listed with some form of outstanding debt; countries not on the list include Nigeria, Libya, Eritrea, Botswana, Algeria, Mauritius, South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Eswatini.