PJ pleads for virus debt cancellation

As the coronavirus disease continues to ravage small economies, former Prime Minister P.J. Patterson is pushing for the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and the African Union (AU) to lobby for debt cancellation while renewing calls for reparation.

Patterson, who is also statesman-in-residence at the Centre of Africa-Caribbean Policy Advocacy named in his honour, said that people of African descent have suffered disproportionally from the disease.

“Globally dispersed African peoples are seriously at risk in the Caribbean and Latin America,” he said in a statement issued yesterday.

According to Patterson, the AU and CARICOM should lobby international financial institutions to restructure the criteria that eliminate middle-income countries from debt relief.

“While we welcome the actions of the IMF (International Monetary Fund) for the suspension of official bilateral debt payments for the poorest countries through to the end of 2020, the case is compelling for the debt cancellation to poor countries,” Patterson said.

Over 40 years, Jamaica repaid more than US$20 billion to the Washington, DC-based institution.

“Renew international campaigns for reparative justice against the enslavement of African people and its residual consequences on affected populations in the African diaspora,” Patterson urged of the AU and CARICOM.

Earlier this month, Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne wrote to the IMF and the World Bank, urging that the financial institutions agree to a number of initiatives aimed at assisting CARICOM countries deal with the socio-economic impact of the coronavirus.

He urged the two financial institutions to consider, in addition to their proposals to the G20 countries, the “suspension of per capita income as a criteria (sic) for concessional financing” as well as “debt relief including suspension of debt payments, write-offs of aged debt particularly by the Paris Club”.

Ratings agency Fitch has said that the Jamaican economy is expected to contract by four per cent this year from the shock of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Government has already requested funding, of around US$500 million, from the IMF to cushion the economic fallout.

The health and wellness ministry yesterday reported five new coronavirus cases in Jamaica.

This has pushed the tally to 257.

It means that in the past 48 hours, there have been 14 confirmed COVID cases.

The 14 comprise six males and eight females aged two to 45 years old from Clarendon and St Catherine.

Nine of these cases are linked to the Alorica call centre, which means that there are now 140 confirmed COVID-19 positives related to the cluster.