I
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION H. R. 2325
To withhold United States support for any action in the International Mone-
tary Fund relating to member states of the Central African Economic
Monetary Community until a determination as to gross foreign exchange
reserves is made.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
MARCH25, 2025
Mr. H
UIZENGA(for himself and Mr. MEUSER) introduced the following bill;
which was referred to the Committee on Financial Services
A BILL
To withhold United States support for any action in the
International Monetary Fund relating to member states
of the Central African Economic Monetary Community
until a determination as to gross foreign exchange re-
serves is made.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Central African Exploi-4
tation and Manipulation of American Companies Act’’ or 5
the ‘‘CEMAC Act’’. 6
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SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 1
The Congress finds as follows: 2
(1) The member states of the Central African 3
Economic Monetary Community (CEMAC) hold sig-4
nificant oil and gas reserves and have enjoyed dec-5
ades long relationships and investments with inter-6
national oil companies (IOCs). 7
(2) In 2018, the central bank for CEMAC, the 8
Bank of Central African States (BEAC) introduced 9
and intended to enact a foreign exchange regulation 10
that mandates extractive industry companies repa-11
triate restoration funds for site rehabilitation to the 12
BEAC. 13
(3) Significant progress has been made in medi-14
ated dialogues over the last 7 years to rectify 23 15
issues with this regulation raised by the IOCs. How-16
ever, significant issues remain including the refusal 17
of BEAC to remove its sovereign immunity from 18
execution, the role of BEAC as custodian of restora-19
tion fund accounts, and the implementation of dou-20
ble jeopardy and material adverse change clauses. 21
(4) BEAC has imposed a completely arbitrary 22
deadline of April 30, 2025, for the IOCs to sign this 23
agreement with penalties equivalent to 150 percent 24
of the restoration fund starting May 1, 2025. 25
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(5) Implementation of this regulation is ex-1
pected to create a lasting negative impact on oil and 2
gas investment in the Central African region, and 3
will drastically compound an already challenging in-4
vestment environment. 5
(6) The member states of BEAC have indicated 6
that these restoration funds will help them shore up 7
their foreign exchange reserves, despite restoration 8
funds being exclusively allocated for restoration work 9
costs and therefore not meeting the criteria of the 10
International Monetary Fund (IMF) for foreign ex-11
change reserves. 12
(7) The IMF’s Balance of Payments and Inter-13
national Investment Position Manual states that as-14
sets must be ‘‘readily available’’ and ‘‘controlled’’ by 15
a country’s monetary authorities to count towards a 16
country’s foreign exchange reserves. 17
(8) Oil and gas investments in the CEMAC re-18
gion have been declining since 2018 and this BEAC 19
foreign exchange regulation is expected to drastically 20
accelerate this decline. 21
(9) Standard & Poor’s estimates that the regu-22
lation by 2050 will result in a reduction of govern-23
ment revenue for CEMAC member states of 24
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$86,000,000,000, and a reduction in capital invest-1
ment of $45,000,000,000 in the region. 2
(10) By refusing to clarify that these restora-3
tion funds will not count towards gross foreign ex-4
change reserves, the IMF has misled the CEMAC 5
member states and directly put tens of billions of 6
dollars of IOCs investment in the region at risk. 7
SEC. 3. STATEMENT OF POLICY. 8
It is the policy of the United States that— 9
(1) the presence of United States companies is 10
a good thing for the regions in which they invest; 11
(2) any funds provided to the Bank of Central 12
African States (in this Act referred to as ‘‘BEAC’’) 13
by any extractive industry company for site rehabili-14
tation are ineligible to count towards the gross for-15
eign exchange reserves of a member state of the 16
Central African Economic Monetary Community (in 17
this Act referred to as ‘‘CEMAC’’) based on the re-18
quirements of the Balance of Payments and Inter-19
national Investment Position Manual of the Inter-20
national Monetary Fund (in this Act referred to as 21
the ‘‘IMF’’); 22
(3) the IMF has a responsibility to accurately 23
clarify to countries what are eligible and ineligible 24
assets to count towards the gross foreign exchange 25
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reserves of a country, so that countries are able to 1
create appropriate financial policies; and 2
(4) the IMF would be responsible for the loss 3
of investment that the CEMAC region would face if 4
a foreign exchange regulation that mandates extrac-5
tive industry companies repatriate restoration funds 6
for site rehabilitation to the BEAC is enacted. 7
SEC. 4. WITHDRAWAL OF FUNDING. 8
(a) I
NGENERAL.—Until the Secretary of the Treas-9
ury, in coordination with the United States Executive Di-10
rector at the IMF and the Secretary of State, makes the 11
determination described in subsection (b)— 12
(1) neither the President nor any person or 13
agency shall, on behalf of the United States, vote to 14
approve any action by the IMF relating to any 15
CEMAC member state; and 16
(2) the Secretary of the Treasury shall direct 17
the United States Executive Director at the IMF to 18
use the voice and vote of the United States to op-19
pose any proposal to— 20
(A) increase the quota in the IMF for any 21
CEMAC member state; or 22
(B) modify the exceptional access policy of 23
the IMF for any CEMAC member state. 24
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(b) DETERMINATION.—The determination referred to 1
in subsection (a) is a determination that the IMF has pub-2
licly clarified that any funds provided to BEAC by any 3
international oil company for site rehabilitation are ineli-4
gible to count towards the gross foreign exchange reserves 5
of any country. 6
(c) P
UBLICATION.—On making the determination de-7
scribed in subsection (b), the Secretary of the Treasury 8
shall publicize the determination and transmit a copy of 9
the determination to the appropriate congressional com-10
mittees. 11
(d) R
EPORT.—No later than 30 days after the date 12
the determination described in subsection (b) is made, and 13
no later than 180 days after the enactment of this Act 14
if the determination has, by then, not been made, the Sec-15
retary of the Treasury shall provide to the appropriate 16
congressional committees a report that details the actions 17
taken by the United States Government at the Inter-18
national Monetary Fund, including those by the United 19
States Executive Director at the IMF, to have the IMF 20
publicly clarify that any funds provided to BEAC by any 21
international oil company for site rehabilitation are ineli-22
gible to count towards the gross foreign exchange reserves 23
of a country. 24
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(e) APPROPRIATECONGRESSIONALCOMMITTEES.— 1
In this section, the term ‘‘appropriate congressional com-2
mittees’’ means— 3
(1) the Committee on Financial Services and 4
the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of 5
Representatives; and 6
(2) the Committee on Finance and the Com-7
mittee on Foreign Relations of the Senate. 8
Æ
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