Senior Credit Research Analyst at Redd Intelligence, Mark Bohlund, has expressed optimism that China would agree to re-profile Ghana’s external debt.

His statement follows concerns that China could block Ghana from getting an IMF deal anytime soon as it did to Zambia and Sri Lanka.

However, according to Mr Bohlund, despite China owning more than 40% of Ghana’s external debt, the amount owed is not as significant as compared to Zambia and Sri Lanka’s debt.

This, he says, would mean China would likely extend the maturity date of Ghana’s debt repayment.

Speaking on JoyNews’ PM Express, he said, “I think it could, but I think it’s important to keep in mind that the Chinese lending, the Chinese part of the external debt in Ghana is very much lower than it is in, for instance, Sri Lanka and Zambia, and that’s one reason to believe that it should be a lot easier to get a deal.”

He added that even in the worst-case scenario the Chinese refuse to be lenient with Ghana, the IMF could “deem that they have sufficient financing assurances to get an IMF Executive Board approval of the IMF programme agreed on staff level previously.”

“Yes, essentially the IMF I think in this case can deem away that even if the Chinese don’t agree to this they could do that.

"I think it is more likely that the Chinese will agree with us over debt re-profiling and just extending maturities rather than having a haircut on the debt and that will be enough to seal a deal with the IMF,” he said.