Browsing: FurtherAfrica

Following recent announcements from the government, Mozambique’s BNI (Banco Nacional de Investimentos) is about to launch two credit lines to assist the country’s SMEs to mitigate the effects of the COVID19 pandemic.

Small and medium companies represent the core of the country’s formal/ informal economy and have been heavily affected by the pandemic. The new credit lines are due to be officially announced by BNI this week and will address specifically SMEs, hospitality and education with an expected interest rate below the market rates.

Also Read: Legal pointers for Mozambique SMEs

The credit lines are meant to assist companies affected by COVID-19 in the entire country and are being financed by the government and the INSS. BNI expect the credit lines to address such issues as maintenance, restitution and the increase of jobs and household income as well as to provide some much breathing room cashflow in affected companies.

Although …

Bearing in mind the Law number 10/2018, of June 26 (Private Investment Law), which adjusted the legal and institutional framework to perform private investments in Angola, the Angolan Government approved the Private Investment’s Legal Proceedings Regulation in order to allow the capture and execution of investments with faster and easier procedures.

The above mentioned regulation establishes the procedures for the legal registration of proposals of private investment projects, the attribution of benefits and advantages, monitoring, supervision, as well as penalties and extinction of rights granted under the Private Investment Law.

The Private Investment projects begin with the delivery of all the relevant documents besides the competent body of AIPEX (Agency for Private Investment and Promotion of Exports of Angola).

Also Read: Angola set to attract more FDI into oil and gas sector

After receiving the private investment project, AIPEX has 5 working days to communicate the decision.

It is, …

Any predictions regarding what economies are going to look like after this crisis, have to be taken at face value by the best buyer. In other words, I believe that any forecast carries a great deal of speculation, as we are sailing uncharted waters and the last few months have proven that, so to compare the current situation to any past crisis is not very efficient to say the least.

Nevertheless, speculation is what we have at hand, and much like everyone else locked up in quarantine, I have been observing the developments and formulating some theories. I’ve also had the privilege of speaking to some very insightful people as I moderated and shared my opinion in a number of webinars and other online platforms, particularly as to the key changes African economies may face in this new reality.

It goes without saying that with over 50 countries on the …

The UK will invest up to £20 million in the new ‘African Union Covid19 Response Fund’ to tackle coronavirus and save lives.

This makes the UK the largest national donor to the fund, which was announced by Cyril Ramaphosa, Chairperson of the African Union (AU) and President of the Republic of South Africa last month. It will support African leaders and technical experts to slow the spread of coronavirus and save lives in Africa and worldwide.

The fund will tackle the pandemic by recruiting African health experts and deploying them where they are needed most, strengthening global tracking of the pandemic, combatting potentially harmful misinformation, providing specialist coronavirus training for health workers and making information about the virus more accessible to the public.

Announcing the funding on May 20th, International Development Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan said:

“As the UK faces its biggest peacetime challenge in tackling coronavirus, it’s never been more

For those investing and particularly interested in Africa, Guinea-Bissau is a country which, so far, has been “under the radar” for most of the investors.

Located in West Africa, bordering with Senegal and Guinea Conakry, Guinea-Bissau is a relatively small country, with 36.125 sq. Km. Around 25% of the total population (estimated in 2.072.000, by figures of April 2020) is based in the capital (Bissau).

The official language is Portuguese, with some other native languages been used (like Balanka, Fula and Mandinka). French is also spoken, due to the influence of the two neighboring countries. Most of the population is Muslim (45%), with 22,1% of Christians and the outstanding percentage spread by indigenous traditional popular religions. Guinea-Bissau is also characterized by a very high level of young population (the medium average age is only 18 years).

Politics in Guinea-Bissau

The political regime is a constitutional democracy, with …

On May 8th, Mozambican Constitutional Council decided that the acts regarding loans to Mozambican state-owned companies (Proindicus, S.A. and MAM, S.A.) and sovereign guarantees given by Mozambican Government are null, and consequently those loans are void.

Having the Mozambican Constitutional Council considered the debts and the guarantees unconstitutional, it means that they never had juridical existence in Mozambique, fact that is reinforced by the circumstance of both National Assembly (through a Parliamentary Inquiry Commission) and Administrative Court had never accepted them as legal.

Constitutional Council based its decision in the following arguments:

1. Mozambican Government could not concede sovereign guarantees of such amounts, since they were superior to the legally established maximum amounts;
2. to grant them, according with Mozambican Constitution, the Government would need to request a legislative authorization to National Assembly, which did not happened;
3. Mozambican Government also violated Mozambican law when agreed loans that were not concessional, since it

FurtherAfrica Insights – COVID19 series with Kenneth Njoroge from the Money Series Africa in Kenya.

A conversation about how the crisis is affecting one of the cornerstones of the Kenyan economy: Small and Medium companies. Kenneth gives his insights on how the government is handling the crisis and the opportunities arising as we prepare to come back to a new normal.…

Nigeria has a rich venture capital environment and in our new reality, startups will need to adapt to fund themselves. Fabio Scala from FurtherAfrica spoke to Aderonke Alex-Adedipe, a partner of Pavestones Nigeria to understand how the upcoming regulations will impact the market, particularly in regards to crowdfunding platforms and the eligibility and limitations companies may see in effect once the crisis is over.…

Africa has some of the most expensive mobile data services in Africa. With the increase in connectivity via smartphones, people in emerging markets can use their portable devices for more things each passing day. Most of us have a smartphone with mobile data that we can carry anywhere and as soon as we step home we switch to our Wi-Fi not to overuse our mobile data; which is most of the time unfairly overcharged.

However some people do not have the privilege to afford both mobile data and internet at home, so they opt for the more expensive but more portable mobile data. Everyday, people in emerging African countries are forced to take this decision and are sometimes charged the most expensive prices in the world for mobile data. What is important to know also is the dependency and impact of smartphones in lower income communities.

With a difficulty in …

A brief conversation with Duarte Marques da Cruz, Partner at the law firm MC&A Advogados about some of the legal aspects that companies operating in Mozambique should be aware during the COVID-19 crisis.…