Africa Calling:
IFC Mobilizes $320 million to Improve and Expand MTC-Celtel Services
in DRC, Madagascar, Malawi, Sierra Leone, Uganda
Financing is IFC’s largest to date in Sub-Saharan Africa
Note: All currency data in US dollars unless otherwise specified.
Cape Town, South Africa, June 13, 2007—IFC, the private sector arm of the World Bank Group, today
announced its largest financing to date in Sub-Saharan Africa, a $320 million package, to five operations
of Celtel International B.V. (an MTC subsidiary) to help expand and upgrade its fast growing mobile
networks in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Madagascar, Malawi, Sierra Leone and Uganda. The
investment will result in better quality mobile access in countries with extremely limited telephone
services, creating new opportunities for businesses and consumers across the economic spectrum.
IFC will provide a $160 million loan for its own account; it’s largest to date in Sub-Saharan Africa. That
loan is complemented by another $160 million in syndicated loans with participating commercial banks
and parallel loans from bilateral financial institutions. The transaction also marks the first ever
mobilization of IFC syndicated loans in Madagascar, Malawi and Sierra Leone, helping to bring longterm (7 year) commercial financing to markets at the frontier of private sector development. The
syndication includes three South African banks that are participating in IFC’s B-loan program for the
first time.
Celtel, which was acquired by MTC of Kuwait in April 2005, will use the funds to modernize and
develop the mobile networks in countries with obsolete and inadequate fixed-line networks and very
low telephone penetration rates, ranging from just over four phones for every 100 people in Malawi
and Madagascar to about 10 per 100 people in Sierra Leone. Since the MTC’s acquisition of Celtel it has
invested $10 billion in African mobile telecom services.
“Investment in infrastructure such as telecommunications is crucial for Africa’s economic development,
and our long term collaboration with IFC shows that the private sector can play an important role in
fulfilling that need” said Mo Ibrahim, Celtel’s Chairman.
Over the past decade, IFC's clients have enabled 80 million subscribers to gain telephone access
globally.
“Infrastructure is one of the key bottlenecks and principal reason for the high cost of doing business in
Africa, which is a drag on economic competitiveness,” said IFC Vice President for Africa, the Middle
East, and Europe Edward Nassim. “The expansion of mobile telephone services to previously
underserved areas will help create a more favorable environment for businesses to operate, thereby
creating jobs and contributing to poverty reduction.”
“Since our first cellular investment in the former Zaire in 1989, IFC has continued to invest heavily in
the sector in Africa and to strengthen our partnership with companies such as Celtel” said Mohsen
Khalil, Director of the World Bank Group’s Global Information and Communication Technologies
department. “Africa is now the fastest growing cellular market, leading the world with truly innovative
service offerings such as Celtel’s borderless free roaming across six countries in Africa.”
IFC has a relationship with Celtel that dates to 1994, through a series of investments with both the
holding company and the operating subsidiaries, including in Sierra Leone and Zambia. These
investments have contributed to the dramatic growth in mobile phone penetration levels, increased
competition and reduced tariffs.
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IFC A-loan = US$160 million
IFC B-loan = US$131 million
IFC Parallel Loans = US$29 million
IFC Financing Details
Celtel DRC
$75 million A-loan, US$64 million in B-loan; $11 million in parallel loans
Celtel Madagascar
$25 million in A-loan, $21 million in B-loan: $4 million in parallel loans
Celtel Malawai
$15 million in A-loan, $9.5 million in B-loan; $5.5 million in parallel loans
Celtel Sierra Leone
$25 million in A-loan, $25 million in B-loan
Celtel Uganda
$20 million in A-loan, $11.5 million in B-loan; $8.5 million in parallel loans
IFC B-Loan Participants
Cordiant
The Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund Limited
FirstRand Bank Limited
Investec Bank Limited
Nedbank Limited
The Netherlands Development Finance Company (FMO)
Parallel Lenders
DEG- Deutsche Investitions- und Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH
PROPARCO
About IFC
IFC, the private sector arm of the World Bank Group, promotes open and competitive markets in developing
countries. IFC supports sustainable private sector companies and other partners in generating productive jobs
and delivering basic services, so that people have opportunities to escape poverty and improve their lives.
Through FY06, IFC Financial Products has committed more than $56 billion in funding for private sector
investments and mobilized an additional $25 billion in syndications for 3,531 companies in 140 developing
countries. IFC Advisory Services and donor partners have provided more than $1 billion in program support to
build small enterprises, to accelerate private participation in infrastructure, to improve the business enabling
environment, to increase access to finance, and to strengthen environmental and social sustainability. For more
information, please visit www.ifc.org.
About Celtel
A fully owned subsidiary of MTC Kuwait, Celtel is the most successful pan-African mobile network, offering
telecommunications services to more people in Africa than any other network. The company is one of the bestknown branded businesses in Africa with mobile licenses covering more than 400 million people, close to half of
Africa’s population. Under the brand promise of ‘Making Life Better’, the company is committed to achieving
sustainable development of telecommunications in Africa. Celtel has more than 20 million customers and
operates mobile cellular operations in 14 countries: Burkina Faso, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon,
Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Niger, Nigeria, Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.
For more information please visit www.celtel.com
MTC is a leading provider of mobile telecommunications in the Middle East and Africa. MTC employs 13,000
people providing a comprehensive range of mobile voice and data services to over 29.7 million active individual
and business customers. In the Middle East, the company operates in Kuwait and Bahrain under the brand name
mtc-vodafone, in Jordan as Fastlink, in Iraq as mtc-atheer, in Lebanon as mtc-touch and in Sudan as ‘Mobitel’.
The Mobile Telecommunications Company KSC (the parent company) is a Kuwaiti shareholding company and
its shares are traded on the Kuwait Stock Exchange. The company’s market capitalisation at 13 June 2007
exceeded US$ 29.5 billion. For more information please visit www.mtctelecom.com
Contacts
IFC
In Cape Town
Desmond Dodd
+2783 448 9873
ddodd@ifc.org
MTC-Celtel
In Amsterdam
Mwambu Wanendeya
+31 23 554 2673
wanendeya.m@celtel.com
In Johannesburg
Houtan Bassiri
+27 11 731 3179
hbassiri@ifc.org
In Kuwait
Antoine Aboukhalil
+965 900 6974
+961 373 3880
a.khalil@mtc.com.lb
In Washington, DC
Henny Rahardja
+1 202 473 4857
hrahardja@worldbank.org