More than 3,000 workers, trade unionists and activists from all over Africa will converge on Accra on Friday, August 29, 2025, to rally for debt cancellation for countries on the continent.
Dubbed the Pan African Debt Cancellation Rally and Trade Justice, the event is meant to drum home inimical loan agreements and credit facilities that have made countries on the continent worse off, leading to high levels of underdevelopment.
The rally is being organised by the African Regional Organisation of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC-Africa), in partnership with the Ghana Trades Union Congress (TUC).
It is part of a week-long series of activities associated with the African Conference on Debt and Development (AfCoDD) being held in Accra from August 25 to 29th this year on the theme:
“Reparations and reparative justice for an African financial architecture and transformation.”
Apart from the unsustainable levels of debt affecting African countries, the conference will also focus on how to improve trade among African countries to boost sustainable development.
Trade unions all over Africa are expected to partake in the conference.
Situation
At the media launch of the event in Accra yesterday, the Deputy Secretary-General of the TUC, Dr Kwabena Nyarko, said unsustainable debt levels, coupled with mismanagement, had stifled development on the continent, leading to hopelessness and despair.
He added that poor leadership and unfair trade practices had continuously turned countries on the continent into paupers, with little to show for development.
“Go through our figures and you will see that we are taking a disproportionate amount of revenues to pay debt instead of spending such amounts on development,” Dr Nyarko said.
He said, although leadership on the continent was to blame for the misfortunes that had bedevilled Africa, it was equally important to highlight some of the economic policies by other nations that continue to put countries on the continent at a disadvantage.
“Linked to the issue of debt is trade. For instance, in Ghana, our markets are flooded with foreign goods, stifling domestic production.
This has to do with the kind of economic policies and arrangements we have with developed countries,” Dr Nyarko said.
He emphasised the need for debt cancellation for African countries to provide the necessary fiscal space for countries to develop, adding that unsustainable debt had eroded the purchasing power of the average African worker.
Victims
For his part, the Chief Economist of ITUC- Africa, Dr Hod Anyigba, said African countries for many years had become victims of unjust debt facilities and trade exploitation.
He called on Africans to rise and demand an end to such injustices for the well-being of the continent.
“We must come together and highlight such injustices or else we will continue to remain in these shackles,” Dr Anyigba added.
