Following the donor-designed path to Mozambique's US 2.2 billion secret debt deal

The paper focuses on a scandal worth US$2.2 billion where weapons and fishing boats where imported to Mozambique and funded by secret loans. The scandal became public in 2016, and following its revelation, the International Monetary Fund cut off its lending to Mozambique with an additional group of 14 donors who halted their support. The author argues that this response was unfair given that the US$2.2 billion itself was the direct result of the conditions carefully created by the same lender and donors over the years. This was part of the attempt of converting Mozambique from a social to a capitalist economy, and part of processes of change management where the Mozambican elite was moved to support and act in the interests of foreign lenders and donors. The paper also argues that this resulted in the conversion of the socialist elite into a comprador group. In this sense, the provided loans and projects create a form of domestic capitalism shaped by donors and lenders, and where business people and members of the new ‘elite’ are expected to service foreign interests, and therefore, the scandal should not appear as a surprise.