t t mboweni : signing of a syndicated loan and comments on the south african economy comments by mr t t mboweni, governor of the south african reserve bank, on the occasion of the signing of the usd1, 5 billion dual tranche syndicated term loan facility, london, 18 july 2005. * * * ladies and gentlemen, i am delighted to address you once again on an occasion such as this and even more delighted to be back in this great city. with the weather you are having here, we could quite easily be experiencing an african winter a€¦ i mean summer. it is a pleasure to welcome you here and to be amongst friends such as yourselves who have shown great confidence in south africa. as many of you live in this city, and almost certainly all of you have operations in london, i think it is right and proper, as we gather here only 10 days after the attacks on london, that i express our sympathy and condolences, on behalf of the south african reserve bank, to those who have been affected. the number of many familiar faces present here today reflects both your commitment to south africa, as well as the south african reserve bank's commitment to building strong relationships with a range of financial institutions. the foreign credit facilities we seek to establish with international institutions such as yourselves are utilised from time to time, or fully drawn down over the period of the loan to supplement our foreign reserves. in this case the us $ 1, 5 billion facility is being used to prepay the us $ 1 billion dual currency term loan facility concluded in june 2003 and tranche b of the dual currency term loan facility concluded in july 2002. in the run - up to this syndicated loan, we were very encouraged to discover during our discussions that the market was more than willing to support a dual - tranche transaction, namely a three - year and a five - year tranche, at reasonable pricing. in negotiating the 2005 facility we took into account the maturity profile of the country's foreign debt, our financing strategy, as well as the desirability of re - establishing the five - year benchmark. whereas not too long ago, a five - year maturity would still have been the subject of debate, today it seems very natural for us to borrow for five years, and thus pave the way for other south african borrowers. it is therefore with great pleasure that we celebrate the successful conclusion of this syndicated loan. the loan was oversubscribed and

mr stals reviews the 1998 imf and world bank annual meetings presentation by the govenor of the south african resrve bank, mr chris stals, to the portfolio committee on finance in cape town, south africa on 04 / 02 / 99 south africa ’ s position in the fund south africa is one of the more than 180 member countries of the imf and the world bank group. at this stage, south africa holds a quota in the imf equal to sdr 1, 365 million ( r9. 3 billion ). the fund is now in the process of raising all quotas by approximately 45 per cent. south africa ’ s quota will increase to sdr 1, 868 million ( r12. 7 billion ). the total new quotas for all members add up to sdr 212 billion. south africa therefore holds about 0. 87 per cent of the total voting rights in the fund. under certain conditions, south africa can borrow its total quota ( r12. 7 billion ) from the fund under normal fund policies, but, of course, subject to the implementation of certain prescribed macroeconomic policies. the fund also provides a number of other specific credit facilities, e. g. the supplemental reserve facility, the compensatory financing facility, and the enhanced structural adjustment facility, that members can make use of under certain conditions. at this stage, south africa has no borrowings outstanding from the fund. the size of a country ’ s quota also determines its participation in the special drawing rights scheme. up to now, south africa has been allocated a total of sdr 220 million. under the terms of a decision of last year, there will be a further allocation of sdrs later this year, when south africa will receive a further amount of sdr 180 million ( r1. 2 billion ). as a member of the imf, south africa has the right to be represented on the executive board of the fund ( 24 executive directors represent all members ). south africa joined the english speaking group of african countries for this purpose ( 20 countries ), and is given an opportunity on a rotation basis amongst the members of this group to appoint an executive director to the fund. ( this group is now represented by mr jose pedro de morais of angola, with mr c. d. r. rustomjee from south africa as the alternative executive director for the group. two years from now, i. e. in september 2000, south africa will provide the executive