European Union opposed to World Bank’s $300 million grant to Ethiopia, says grant money to Ethiopian ministry of finance while war in Tigray is ongoing will be “counterproductive”

Simon Ateba( Chief White House Correspondent )

Simon Ateba is Chief White House Correspondent for Today News Africa. Simon covers President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, the U.S. government, the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and other financial and international institutions in Washington D.C. and New York City.

The World Bank Board approved a $300 million grant for Ethiopia on April 12 to support the people who have been impacted by the conflict in the East African nation, but the European Union, which is not a shareholder of the bank, has asserted that the money will make things worse, the grant is ‘premature” and should have been postponed altogether.

According to the EU, the $300 million grant, which will be implemented by Ethiopia’s Ministry of Finance, will potentially disrupt the still fragile peace between the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). It tried to postpone the grant approval, urging the World Bank to take more time to assess the security situation in the country before bankrolling reconstruction programs while peace is yet to return.

“To us, peace is still too fragile to start financing the reconstruction in Northern Ethiopia,” Devex quoted an EU spokesperson as saying on Wednesday in an email. “In this regard, the World Bank’s $300 million grant for reconstruction decided at its Board meeting on April 12 is premature and could be counterproductive in the context of the current political stalemate.”