The IMF admits Mozambique spends more on debt service than
on health and education. Debt service during 1995-97 averaged $7.45 per person per year; health and education spending was $5.04 according to the government or $6.76 according to the IMF.
If just half of the debt service payments were spent on health and education, it would save the lives of more than 300 children each day -- of the more than 200,000 children now killed each year. How did Mozambique acquire its debt? Mozambique is also a post-war country, which suffered $20 billion damage at the hands of apartheid South Africa which had been backed by German banks and companies. But Germany has consistently been the strongest opponent of debt relief.
At the G8 meeting in Birmingham, England, on 16 May, it blocked negotiations over Mozambique; Britain and Brazil were forced to provide an extra $10 million each, which was effectively aid to Germany (not to Mozambique).
* source: World Bank, World Tables. Washington, 1993