Maravi

(TALKZIMBABWE) IMF loan: Biti swallows before he chews

IMF loan: Biti swallows before he chews
Comment
Mon, 07 Sep 2009 23:54:00 +0000

THE Minister of Finance, Tendai Biti has embarassed himself again by arguing against technical issues that he is proving not able to understand. He told Deutsch Press Agency that Zimbabwe could not afford a recent loan secured by the Reserve Bank Governor Dr Gideon Gono from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Said Biti when the Reserve Bank secured the loan: ""We would be contracting debt when our balance of payments and our debt burden is very fragile. We have less than US$2 million in import reserves.

"Our arrears account for 150 percent of gross domestic product. There is no way we can take that (loan) up in the context of the arrears and the deficit. It would be very imprudent."

In an embarassing twist of events, it has emerged that Minister Biti had not done his homework when he spoke to DPA.

I hope that Minister Biti did not expect to be part of a "handover ceremony" of the funds. The IMF is a technical organisation and does not meddle in internal politics of member countries.

IMF relates to member states on bilateral and not partisan and/or personal levels. It was thus normal that the money was deposited with the central bank on the basis of treaties ratified by Zimbabwe as a member state.

It has now emerged that the maximum interest Government will pay on the US$510 million loan is a meagre 0,26 percent per annum.

Minister Biti thinks this is unsustainable, or has simply no clue how "these things work".

"If this is an unsustainable loan then we are saying Zimbabwe wants money for free. Please let us be real," said Dr Munyaradzi Kereke, RBZ Governor Dr Gono's adviser.

"As technical experts we feel deeply aggrieved that our productive efforts seem to be spilling at the dinner table thanks to mysterious brawls which seem to put the nation’s interests second to other objectives which we don’t know about."

Maybe Minister Biti would like to explain to the nation what interest rate he considers sustainable. 0% perchance? He simply wants Zimbabwe to become a begging nation: something he accuses the previous government of.

Labels: IMF, TENDAI BITI

posted by MrK @ 3:03 PM