Ottoman Public Debt Management
Former seat of the Ottoman Public Debt Administration in Istanbul.
The Ottoman Public Debt Administration (OPDA) was an organization established by Sultan Abdul Hamid (Turkish: Düyûn-ı Umûmiyye-i Osmâniyye İdare Meclisi) II according to the Decree of Muharram of 20 of December of 1881 and controlled by the European powers, whose object was to collect via taxes the payments that Ottoman Empire owed to diverse companies of Europe.
Its headquarters in Constantinople, built by Alexander Vallaury and Raimondo D'Aronco in 1890, now houses the İstanbul Lisesi. History
The problems of the Ottoman public debt went back to the Crimean War and the debts that the Empire contracted to be able to face the Russians. In 1875 its nominal value was £ 200,000,000, with annual interest and repayment payments of £ 12,000,000, more than half of the income of the imperial estate. The outbreak of the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878) only aggravated the situation.
The Sublime Door renegotiated its debt and agreed to forgive part of it, which was reduced from 191,000,000 to 106,000,000, establishing the OPDA in return to secure payments. The OPDA constituted a vast, virtually independent, bureaucratic apparatus within the Ottoman bureaucracy, run by creditors. It employed 5,000 officials collecting all taxes on timbre, spirits, fishing, silks and monopolies of salt and tobacco, as well as taxes from Bulgaria, Cyprus and Eastern Rumelia.
The OPDA played an important role in Ottoman financial affairs, also serving as an intermediary for European investors in the Empire. In 1900, OPDA financed numerous railways and other industries.
The establishment of the OPDA restored the Ottoman finance credit. However, the government of Sultan Abdul Hamid II did not cease in his financial irresponsibility, spending enormous sums, for example, in the construction and expansion of its sumptuous palaces, such as those of Dolmabahçe and Yildiz. Between 1886 and 1914, the government applied for 23 loans for a total amount of 150 million pounds. In this last date the debt amounted to 140 million, around 60% of the income. After the fall of the Sultanate and the Caliphate, and the establishment of the Republic of Turkey, in 1929 it was agreed that the new state would only pay 67% of the debt, 107.5 billion gold lire.
wiki