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Senegal’s Prime Minister, Ousmane Sonko, has said the country will not pursue debt restructuring despite mounting repayment pressures.
Speaking on Thursday, Sonko acknowledged that Senegal faces a challenging debt profile but insisted the government believes it can navigate the situation without renegotiating its obligations.
The West African nation is grappling with a heavy debt burden, which the International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates reached 132 per cent of GDP at the end of 2024, following the discovery of previously unreported liabilities under the former administration.
The revelation prompted the IMF to suspend a $1.8 billion lending programme, pushing Senegal to rely more heavily on regional debt markets to finance its needs.
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While analysts and investors have warned that restructuring may become unavoidable, Sonko said the government’s assessments show a viable path out of the crisis without such measures.
Addressing a joint press conference with Mauritania’s prime minister, Sonko said Senegal considers its debt sustainable, noting that the country has continued to meet its repayment obligations for over a year.
“All the work we have done allows us to see a possibility of getting out of this situation without the need for restructuring.
“Based on our analysis, we consider our debt to be sustainable, as we have been managing to repay it for a year and a half.”
He admitted that repayment deadlines this year would be particularly difficult but expressed confidence that solutions would be found.
The prime minister added that government projections for economic growth and revenue had been validated by international partners, including the IMF, stressing that the core challenge facing the country was financing rather than debt sustainability.
Last week, Finance Minister Cheikh Diba said Senegal hoped to conclude a new programme with the IMF soon, noting that progress had been made on several outstanding issues related to managing the debt crisis.
