President Bola Tinubu has welcomed the planned launch of the African Credit Rating Agency (AfCRA), saying Africa needs financial institutions that better understand the continent’s economies and risks.
The African Union has announced that the agency will officially launch on 7 October in Port Louis, Mauritius.
President Tinubu said the development was another step towards building African financial institutions capable of providing more accurate assessments of the continent’s economies.
The president disclosed this in a post on his official X account on Thursday, recalling that he had advocated for an African credit rating agency in a February 2026 Financial Times article.
He said he also raised the issue at the Africa CEO Forum in Kigali, Rwanda, in May, where he called for Africa to develop financial institutions that understand its economic realities.
“Africa is not asking for favourable ratings. We are asking for fair ratings, grounded in our fundamentals and in the reforms our economies are actually carrying out,” he said.
Why the agency matters
Credit ratings influence how investors assess the risk of lending to countries and companies. They can also affect borrowing costs and the amount of capital available to governments and businesses.
African governments have repeatedly raised concerns about what they describe as an “Africa premium”, under which African countries may face higher borrowing costs because of how investors perceive the continent’s risks.
The three major global rating agencies, including Fitch, Moody’s and S&P Global Ratings, currently play a major role in assessing African sovereign and corporate borrowers.
President Tinubu, in an article published by Financial Times, argued that African economies were paying too much to borrow because international…
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