Pak Finance minister cancels US visit amid domestic political, judicial crisis

Pakistans Finance Minister Ishaq Dar has cancelled his visit to the US to attend the spring meetings of the World Bank and the IMF and hold talks with officials to unlock a muchneeded USD 11 billion IMF bailout amid deepening domestic political uncertainty and developing judicial crisis according to a media report on FridayDuring the visit Dar was to meet the International Monetary Fund management for the removal of bottlenecks in the stafflevel agreement on the revival of the stalled bailout packageSources said that Dar would not attend the spring meetings of the World Bank and the IMF that will take place from April 10 to 16 in Washington The Express Tribune newspaper reportedI am not going due to the domestic state of affairs the newspaper quoted Dar as sayingThe deepening political uncertainty and developing judicial crisis were said to be the reasons behind the cancellation of the trip to Washington the paper saidDar had the plan to address the financial and political worlds concerns regarding the continuity of the Pakistan government future economic plans and bridging the once again trust deficit with the multilateral lendersThe sources said that Minister for Economic Affairs Sardar Ayaz Sadiq would also not go to the United States due to the prevailing uncertain political conditionsThe economic affairs minister always represented Pakistan at the World Bank Ayaz is considered very close to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and also handled the political affairs of the allied partiesThe development came amid the widening chasm between the judiciary and the federal government over holding polls in the countrys politically crucial Punjab provinceThe federal government asserts that it has the power to delay the polls and hold them with the general elections in the country after August this year However former prime minister Imran Khans Pakistan TehreekeInsaf party has been pushing for early polls and demanding that instead of delaying the elections in the Punjab province the national assembly should be dissolved and general elections called in the countryAlso read Four Pakistan soldiers killed in terror attack along Iran borderFinance Secretary Hamed Yaqoob Sheikh and Economic Affairs Secretary Kazim Niaz would now represent the government at the WBIMF spring meetingsDuring the visit Dar scheduled meetings with the presidents of WB Asian Development Bank and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank the three multilateral creditors that were very crucial for Pakistans plans to raise USD 6 billion in additional loans to meet the last IMF conditionCashstrapped Pakistan is awaiting a muchneeded USD 11 billion tranche of funding from the Washingtonbased IMF which was originally due to be disbursed in November last yearThe funds are part of a USD 65 billion bailout package the IMF approved in 2019 which analysts say is critical if Pakistan is to avoid defaulting on external debt obligationsThe IMF programme signed in 2019 is going to expire on June 30 2023 and under the set guidelines the programme cannot be extended beyond the deadlineThe pending 9th review was scheduled to be completed in December 2022 and the 10th review should have been kickstarted from February 2023 The 11th review was scheduled to commence on May 3Pakistan and the IMF have been negotiating the resumption of the stalled programme for months but have yet to reach an agreementThere is no easy solution available to fix the ailing economy of Pakistan and the government is of the view that they have taken all the tough decisions for reviving the stalled IMF programmePakistan currently in the throes of a major economic crisis is grappling with high external debt a weak local currency and dwindling foreign exchange reserves enough to shore up for barely one months importsThe current volatile political situation in Pakistan has become a factor in delaying a muchneeded deal with the IMFThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever