Former Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo has warned that Africa’s future cannot be built on the foundations of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, institutions he argued were never designed to serve the continent’s best interests.
Speaking at the Intra-African Trade Fair in Algiers, Mr. Obasanjo pressed African leaders to turn their focus inward, strengthening regional integration and boosting intra-African trade as the path to long-term prosperity.
“The World Bank is not for us; the IMF is not for us,” he said. “Once we understand that, we will know how to deal with them.”
His remarks underscored a growing unease across African capitals over the weight of multilateral financial institutions in shaping economic policy. Many governments remain heavily dependent on IMF credit lines and World Bank programs, even as critics say such arrangements often deepen debt burdens and constrain policy flexibility.
Mr. Obasanjo, who led Nigeria from 1999 to 2007, also called for more trade settlements in local currencies to reduce reliance on the United States dollar, which he said continues to exert pressure on fragile African currencies.
The former president’s intervention comes amid rising interest in the African Continental Free Trade Area, an ambitious project intended to knit together 1.4 billion people into a single market. Advocates say the framework could help shield African economies from external shocks, though implementation has lagged.
By urging a shift away from Washington-led institutions, Mr. Obasanjo placed himself squarely within a wider debate over how Africa should finance its development and manage its economic sovereignty.
