China Eximbank provides $19.19 million loan for Mpila Memorial Construction Project (Linked to Project ID#60219)

On June 19, 2006, China Eximbank and the Republic of Congo signed a $1.6 billion loan framework agreement — also known in the Republic of Congo as the “strategic partnership” (“partenariat stratégique”) — that allowed the Republic of Congo to obtain China Eximbank loans for infrastructure projects through a securitization mechanism: Société Nationales des Pétroles Congolais (SNPC)—the country’s state-owned oil company—agreed to deposit a portion of the cash proceeds from its oil exports into an escrow account that is controlled by China Eximbank. This framework agreement (captured in Project ID#60219) was ratified on October 26, 2006. One of the subsidiary loans that was approved through the framework agreement was a $19,191,458.40 loan in 2014 for the Mpila Memorial Construction Project. This subsidiary loan agreement was signed on June 12, 2014. The loan carried a 14-year maturity and a 0.25% interest rate. Its estimated grace period was 4 years. Its (principal) amount outstanding was $15,961,700 as of December 31, 2019. The project involved the construction of a memorial in the Mpila neighborhood within the capital city of Brazzaville. It was part of a larger Chinese Government-funded effort to rebuild parts of Brazzaville that were destroyed by a deadly March 2012 blast at a munitions depot in the Mpila neighborhood within the capital city of Brazzaville. China Jiangsu International Economic Technical Cooperation Corporation was the contractor responsible for implementation. This project had achieved a 100% execution rate as of March 31, 2019.

Additional details

1. The Chinese project title is 姆皮拉纪念馆 or 刚果（布）MPILA纪念馆. The French project title is Chantier Mémorial de l'Histoire or Projet de construction du mémorial de Mpila. 2. The loan that supported this project is included in the database of Chinese loan commitments that SAIS-CARI released in July 2020. However. SAIS-CARI does not record the borrowing terms of this loan. AidData relies on the face value of the loan ($19,191,458.40) and the maturity length (14 years) that is recorded by the Republic of Congo’s Public Debt Agency (Caisse Congolaise d’Amortissement or CCA) and Délégation Générale des Grands Travaux (DGGT). According to a 2019 report published by the Republic of Congo’s National Assembly, all loans approved under the June 19, 2006 framework agreement had an interest rate of 0.25% and grace periods between 3 and 5 years. Therefore, since the grace period of the China Eximbank loan for the Mpila Memorial Construction Project is missing, AidData imputes a value (4 years) at the middle of the distribution of this range as an approximation. A China Eximbank source indicates that $410 million was provided for the construction of Mpila Memorial Construction Project, the Mpila Shopping Center Construction Project, and the Brazzaville Commercial Center (Mpila Twin Towers) Construction Project. This monetary value is roughly equivalent to the combined value of the 3 Chinese Eximbank loans that were issued for these projects: a $19.19 million loan for the Mpila Memorial Construction Project (captured in Project#58721), a $62.3 million loan for the Mpila Shopping Center Construction Project (captured in Project#58408), and a $328.1 million loan for the Mpila Twin Towers Construction Project (captured in Project ID#58720). Other Chinese sources refer to the Mpila Memorial Construction Project and Mpila Shopping Center Construction Project together (姆皮拉纪念馆及商业中心) and describe the total cost of these projects as $81.9 million.

Number of official sources

11

Number of total sources

15