In 2023, developing countries paid a record US$ 1.4 trillion to service their public debt, according to the United Nations report "A World of Debt", published in 2024. As a candidate for Secretary-General, President Macky Sall places the reform of the global financial architecture among his priorities. Inherited from another world, its rules weigh first on countries that had little hand in writing them.

Access to finance at two speeds. The same project, whether a road, a hospital or a power grid, costs several times more to finance depending on which country undertakes it. The cost of capital erodes tight budgets year after year, and a government's effort dissolves into a risk premium it does not control. Two economies with similar fundamentals borrow at different rates, and the gap is paid in schools and clinics that never rise from the ground.

A debt that smothers development. In many countries, debt service now exceeds spending on health or education, and repayment comes before care. The common framework for debt treatment exists to reschedule a burden that has become unbearable. Yet it acts too late and too slowly for the states it was meant to protect: relief arrives once the weight has already fallen on the population, at the emergency stage rather than as prevention.

The special drawing rights of 2021. That issuance mainly strengthened the reserves of economies that did not need them. Their rechannelling toward the countries that lack them, promised since, still falls short of the commitments made. This liquidity sits idle in the economies that received the most, when elsewhere it would be enough to save a growing season.

Debt and peace. Without setting interest rates or voting the budgets of the financial institutions, the Secretary-General can convene states and put development finance on the agenda of peace. A debt that deprives a country of its schools prepares the instability the Security Council will later have to address. The United Nations conference on financing for development has set a course, and its follow-up still has to be ensured year by year.

In figures. According to the same United Nations report, 3.3 billion people live in countries that spend more on interest than on health or education. The world is short about US$ 4 trillion a year to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (UNCTAD). In 2021 the International Monetary Fund issued US$ 650 billion in Special Drawing Rights; African countries, home to 1.4 billion people, received close to 5 per cent of it.

Experience in government and at the African Union. The proposals on debt and special drawing rights rest on twelve years as head of state and on the chairmanship of the African Union in 2022. That experience explains why the vision statement filed with the United Nations frames its proposals as obligations; development sits in the same pillar as peace and security.

Africa at its heart, the world in its sights.

The United Nations' work on financing for development is public. Read all public positions at www.mackysall.net