Special Drawing Rights And Its Impact On Economic Justice, Towards Reconstructing The New African Economic Order

Abstract

Foreign debt continues to undermine Africa’s progress towards the attainment of human rights. Consequently, this research paper considers whether funds accessible through Special Drawing Rights (SDR) can be allocated towards African States facing revenue shortfalls instead of relying on foreign debt. It also looks at how SDR can support reconstruction of a new economic order in Africa. The paper finds that SDR allocation offers some sort of financial relief to African States who are members of the International Monetary Fund. The paper argues that a huge SDR allocation has the potential to support reconstruction of a new economic order in Africa. To achieve this, African States should continue to push for a fairer SDR allocation system, redistribution of unused SDRs to debt distressed African nations and formation of a Resilience and Sustainability Trust that will offer unconditional and cost free loans. In the meantime, there is a need for strong domestic reforms and debt restructuring even on humanitarian basis since financing by the international community seems to be a challenge.