Coronavirus: Cancel The Debt

Call on the Irish government to use its influence in the EU, the IMF and the World Bank to cancel debts for the Global South.

Our local neighbours are feeling the devastating effects of a virus that impacts us all.

As the pandemic spreads into the poorest countries in the world, our neighbours around the world will face these impacts, often without the same safety nets we’ve seen at home.

The most vulnerable are falling ill and the economic impacts are leaving people who were already struggling, without a way to feed their families and survive this crisis.

Right now, you can help prevent people from suffering and death due to the health and economic impacts of the pandemic by supporting calls for a debt ‘jubilee’ – requested by governments of poor and vulnerable countries. This would mean debt repayments of poor countries are cancelled during this crisis.

Will you call on Minister Pascal Donohoe to broker a debt relief deal for the poorest countries?

View the full petition text

Covid-19 Campaign e-petition

Covid-19 - Petition message

I am writing to you because, although the situation in relation to the Coronavirus at home in Ireland is grave, I want you to remember the many countries in the Global South where the impacts of the pandemic might be much, much worse.

That's because so many of them do not have the infrastructure or public services to begin to tackle a health crisis on the scale of the Coronavirus pandemic. Often, this situation has been worsened by a philosophy of prioritising private finance over and above public investment, for many decades.

Millions of people in some of the poorest countries in the world are facing a devastating health, social and economic crisis as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, 69 low-income countries are due to spend $25 billion on debt payments in 2020 alone. Cancelling debt payments is the fastest way to free up existing public resources to tackle this devastating crisis. Additional emergency finance of up to US$ 73.1 billion is also needed.

To give countries in the Global South the best chance of tackling the Coronavirus, I want Ireland to show leadership on three issues, in the EU, IMF and World Bank:

(1) Cancel all debt payments for countries suffering from the economic impacts of coronavirus, due in 2020.
(2) Help countries in trouble to restructure their debt rather than bailing out lenders.
(3) Ensure new finance, granted to tackle the coronavirus, does not create more debt.

Many thanks,

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Coronavirus: Cancel The Debt

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