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CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC

Touadéra banks on bitcoin to avert bankruptcy

Central African President Faustin-Archange Touadera. © Michael Brochstein/ZUMA Wire/Alamy Live News

After loudly making bitcoin legal tender in CAR, the country's president is expected in Dubai at the end of the week to oversee the launch of a cryptocurrency mining company. The aim is to ensure that civil servants can be paid in July, at a time when state coffers are empty. [...]

Published on 10/05/2022 at 05:00 GMT Reading time 3 minutes

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Finance Politics

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Abbas Mahamat Tolli
Abebe Aemro Selassie
European Union
Faustin Archange Touadera
Herve Ndoba
International Monetary Fund
Nicolae Bogdan Buzaianu
Pierre Somse
Sandra Boodhun
Wagner
World Bank
Yahya Jammeh

Touadéra seeks to sideline parliament over lucrative mining contracts

Draft CAR constitution boosts Touadéra, eases Wagner mining constraints.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Finance Diplomacy 13/07/2023

Mohammed bin Salman discreetly bails out Touadéra

CAR received a timely FCFA 11bn loan from Saudi Arabia in 2022, the biggest bilateral loan that year. Traditional lenders declined to offer fresh credit because of concerns about the growing influence of the Wagner group.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Mining Business 27/03/2023

Nicolae Buzaianu goes for gold in Bangui

Swiss-Romanian businessman Nicolae Bogdan Buzaianu wants to invest in gold in CAR. He met with President Faustin-Archange Touadera to discuss buying or building a foundry there.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Business 07/02/2023

CAR's first crypto investors stuck on hold

Several buyers of Sangocoin, the cryptocurrency launched by Central African Republic President Faustin-Archange Touadéra, are still waiting for it to go live. But first, laws need to be changed so that they can receive their promised purchase dividends, such as CAR passports.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Diplomacy 18/01/2023

Special adviser Sandra Boodhun turns to homeland Mauritius to build trade

The latest initiative to replenish CAR's dwindling cash supplies comes from special adviser, Sandra Boodhun of Mauritius.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Finance Diplomacy 01/11/2022

IMF keeps Bangui waiting for new study mission

Central African Republic PM Felix Moloua and finance minister Herve Ndoba have managed to get the IMF to send a mission to study the country's financial situation.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Finance Politics 24/10/2022

The battle of Touadéra's true and false bitcoin advisers

The CAR's bitcoin policy is drawing attention, as proved by several businessmen in recent weeks.

President of the Central African Republic Faustin-Archange Touadera on September 17, 2021, in Bangui. © Barbara Debout/AFP

Spotlight

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Finance Politics 22/06/2022

Bitcoin project splits Touadéra's entourage

The Central African president is trying to speed up his cryptocurrency project, despite scepticism from some of his ministers. The local director of the Bank of Central African States, Ali Chaibou, is one of the doubters and has secretly sought the advice of former IMF director Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC NIGER Diplomacy 21/06/2022

World Bank names new country managers

Han Fraeters, the World Bank's representative in Central African Republic, is leaving his current role for a new posting in Niamey in Niger. He will replace Joelle Dehasse there, who left for Panama in March.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Politics 30/05/2022

Bangui's mayor on the lookout for a new urban planner

The Central African capital is set to benefit from financial aid from the African Development Bank to carry out its development plans, which comes on top of partnerships already established with French and other international organisations.

Bangui Mayor Emile-Gros Raymond Nakombo.

AFRICA UNITED ARAB EMIRATES Commodity traders 27/05/2022

Dubai takes advantage of war in Ukraine to boost business in Africa

The Dubai Multi Commodities Centre sees the challenging commodity market environment as an opportunity to strengthen its trading position in Africa by welcoming Russian and Swiss traders and promoting the use of cryptocurrencies.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Diplomacy 17/05/2022

France's 'hassling' of senior regime figures adds to tensions between Paris and Bangui

Foreign minister Sylvie Baipo-Temon and National Assembly deputy speaker Evariste Ngamana are both furious after having been taken to task by the French authorities recently.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sylvie Baïpo-Témon, and the Vice-President of the National Assembly, Evariste Ngamana.

CENTRAL AFRICA Commodity traders Business 03/03/2022

Nicolae Buzaianu pitches bitcoin venture in CAR

Swiss-Romanian businessman Nicolae Bogdan Buzaianu, who is energetically courting officials in the Central African Republic, is looking beyond timber into generating cryptocurrency and setting up bitcoin mining centres in the country.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Politics Diplomacy 21/12/2021

Sandra Boodhun, Touadéra's new ubiquitous adviser Free

Central African President Faustin Archange Touadéra's new Mauritian adviser Sandra Boodhun has been at his side on all his latest trips abroad, most recently in Dubai.

CAR president Faustin Archange Touadéra (left) with his adviser Sandra Boodhun (centre)

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC Politics 02/12/2021

Touadéra and Moscow protect warlord Hassan Bouba from international justice

By targeting one of the emblematic figures of the Central African Republic conflict - livestock minister and former rebel leader Hassan Bouba - the Bangui special criminal court has thrown a spanner into an already uneasy mix of peace deals, jittery financial backers and Russian mercenaries.

Central African livestock minister Hassan Bouba in February 2021.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC CHAD Finance Politics 22/11/2021

IMF splashes out for some CEMAC states but leaves N'Djamena and Bangui hanging

Since the beginning of the year, the International Monetary Fund has signed support programmes with four of the six countries in the oil-dependent and Covid-weakened Central African monetary zone. But its talks with Chad and the Central African Republic have stalled.

On our other sites

Intelligence Online 25/05/2022

Scorechain investigates cryptoassets seized by France

Luxembourg-based crypto investigations company Scorechain is helping the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations, which keeps cryptoassets snatched by Agrasc - the French state agency in charge of seized and confiscated assets - until they are resold.

Set up email notifications for these topics

Abbas Mahamat Tolli
Abebe Aemro Selassie
European Union
Faustin Archange Touadera
Herve Ndoba
International Monetary Fund
Nicolae Bogdan Buzaianu
Pierre Somse
Sandra Boodhun
Wagner
World Bank
Yahya Jammeh

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