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The New Heritage Party (NHP) President, Chishala Kateka, has challenged government to give its position paper concerning the Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) bloc and de-dollarisation.
Kateka in a statement issued in Lusaka on Monday said a number of countries have applied to join who formed an alliance and are setting themselves up as an alternative to existing international financial and political forums.
She said 19 countries, among them Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Algeria, Bahrain and Iran, have officially applied to join this bloc and the nations in support of this BRICS are those that are quite strong and not capable of being bullied by the West.
Kateka said this simply means reducing the reliance, by certain nations, on the United States (US) Dollar as a medium of exchange in international trade because this has led to the hegemony by the USA in world trade that has been witnessed.
She said the de-dollarization call, has been accelerated due to the disconnection of Russia from the dollar trading SWIFT payment system and the BRICS group have established their own development bank to do the work for the International Monetary Fund and World Bank are doing.
“Smaller countries have now been prompted to look for alternatives to the SWIFT payment system upon realizing that they can, in fact, survive outside of the traditionally accepted dollar-based system,” She said.
Kateka said closer to home, Kenya’s President William Ruto recently announced that his government will now purchase oil using Kenyan Shillings.
Read More:On de-dollarisation and the BRICS by Bright Chizonde
She said with Russia being cast adrift, she has negotiated with countries such as China and India, an alternative payment system.
“It’s a great shift and a lot of nations are waking up to the fact that they do not need to enslaved or at the mercy of the USA by holding USD reserves,” Kateka said.
She said Zambia finds herself in a financially vulnerable position but at end of the day, decisions need to be made to benefit the current and future generations, after a careful and well thought analysis.
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