Carte Blanche with Perry

The US Congress, last week approved the 2016 Appropriations Bill that effectively put paid to the long drawn issue of International Monetary Fund (IMF) quota and governance reforms pushed for since 2010. Back in 2010 when the IMF Executive Board recommended the reforms, then IMF Managing Director, Dominique Strauss-Kahn described the agreement as a “major step forward in the modernization of the IMF and its efforts to adjust its structures to the dynamic and changing realities of the global economy. His successor Christine Lagarde has also echoed similar sentiments following the authorization to carry out the reforms by the US Congress. In a press statement, she said, “ “The United States Congress approval of these reforms is a welcome and crucial step forward that will strengthen the IMF in its role of supporting global financial stability. The reforms significantly increase the IMF's core resources, enabling us to respond to crises more effectively, and also improve the IM...

Which hand has Africa been dealt this year you may be wondering? Well take slumping commodity prices, entire reliance on one export destination – China - added onto the effects of this Chinese economy slowing down appreciably in the last 18 months, and what you get is Africa increasingly bearing the brunt of the turmoil in Beijing. This is a classic case of China sneezing, and the whole of Africa catching a cold. Little wonder, especially considering that Chinese investment into Africa significantly outstrips that of all other countries, accounting for as much as $3 to each $1 from the United States for instance. For Africa, the weak pace of growth in the Chinese economy has meant lower demand for its commodities, leading to Sino-Africa trade almost dropping by half from its peak during the 2013-2014 periods. China which is Africa`s largest trading partner is now battling the effects of debt fueled expenditure which created overcapacity in its economy, misallo...

  From its exclusion, albeit voluntarily from the biennial Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings to the recently concluded US – Africa leaders’ summit in which over 50 heads of African states were invited in Washington DC, Zimbabwe has been like a black sheep missing out on such key events. Certainly, these and such other international gatherings are not make or break events, whose failure to attend would spell doom for countries. The State run media in Zimbabwe, certainly made this clear as it published an article that branded the August 4 to 6 event as, “President Obama`s speed dating exercise.” In it, the argument is made that it is inconceivable how anything significant will be achieved in a mere 3 days, when the Obama administration has ignored Africa for 5 years. The summit is viewed just as a talk shop and a series of lectures by Barack Obama, in which African leaders hold no sway. It's just that at a time when Zimbabwe has been pushing a re-engagement ag...

That China has emerged as a global economic powerhouse especially in the aftermaths of the global financial crisis cannot be disputed. In fact, it is credited as having been the key driver of global economic growth, in a period where the western economic markets were largely subdued. Africa has benefitted immensely from the growth of the Chinese economy in the recent past. Statistics show that by the end of 2012, China`s Foreign Direct Investment in the continent approached the $20 billion mark. For all intents and purposes, this is a significant amount of investment which goes to show the prominence with which the so called ‘sleeping giant’ is rising. Zimbabwe has increasingly become more reliant on China, on the back of the ‘look east policy’ being pursued by the Zimbabwean government. Chinese owned Anjin investments invested $400 million to form a joint venture with the Zimbabwean government to mine diamonds in the Marange fields. Furthermore, various companies in the count...