Vladyslav Rashkovan, Alternate Executive Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) from Ukraine, said that all the planned meetings of the Fund's mission that began work on December 21, 2020 and lasted three working days, went well.
However, due to the fact that the mission worked remotely (through online conferences and collaborations) and due to the New Year's holidays its work could drag on for two weeks, he wrote wrote on his Facebook page.
«You shouldn't wait for any announcements about the end of the mission now or associate the lack of communication with any problems. The negotiations progress is confidential, so I never publicly comment on it and do not answer how the mission is going. I can only say that all the planned meetings, both at the highest level and at the expert level, were held in three days and went well.»
Vladyslav Rashkovan
Alternate Executive Director of the International Monetary Fund
Rashkovan also hoped that in a few months it will be possible to organize a conversation between the Managing Director of the IMF and the leadership of Ukraine to express "words of mutual gratitude and respect after receiving the next tranche," but for this to happen, everyone must do their job.
As for the duration of the mission, Rashkovan noted that the remote format and a time difference (7 hours) between Kyiv and Washington allow working only 4-5 hours instead of the usual 8-10. Therefore, according to him, the work of the mission will continue after the end of the New Year holidays, since in total it lasts a full 10-12 days.
What will happen to the IMF tranche to Ukraine after the end of the mission
"It is important to understand that the mission does not make decisions on the tranche payment. After the end of the mission and upon reaching an agreement at the staff level, the two-way road reopens. The head of the mission "virtually returns" to the office and begins to draft a staff report—a report on the mission results," he explained.
At the same time, the government is fulfilling some of the obligations it has assumed in the negotiation process. If the following events coincide: agreement on the mission report text (staff report), signing of the letter of intent (LOI) by the government, final agreement on the Memorandum of Economic and Financial Policies (MEFP) text and the fulfillment of program preconditions, then the mission leader sends all materials for consideration by the Executive Board of the Fund Directors. And the Executive Board decides on the tranche allocation to the country. The Board includes 24 executive directors or their deputies, each of whom has a certain vote percentage.
Context. Earlier, Oleg Gavrysh, Deputy Chief Editor of , wrote in his column that, according to a source in the Ministry of Finance, the IMF will not provide the next tranche before spring 2021 due to the fact that planned work and reforms have failed. ЭThis is the price of experiments that were carried out with NABU, CCU (Constitutional Court of Ukraine), National Bank and Anti-Covid Fund in 2020," the source noted.
At the same time, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal claimed that Ukraine could receive another tranche from the International Monetary Fund in February-March 2021.