Waiting for IMF

FINANCE Minister Ishaq Dar has blamed the delay in the conclusion of discussions with the IMF on the ‘trust deficit’ created by the previous government, accusing it of not meeting its commitments to the lender after signing the $6bn funding programme in 2019. He is right to the extent that the present PML-N-led set-up inherited a fractured relationship with the Fund, because the PTI either dragged its feet on economic reforms it had pledged to carry out or reversed some of them soon after their implementation. But the problem didn’t start with the PTI government. Islamabad has a long history of breaking promises it made to the IMF over 23 programmes in seven decades. Little wonder Pakistan was called a ‘one-tranche’ country until not very long ago. Mr Dar, too, has contributed his bit to enlarging the credibility gap by deviating from the programme his predecessor had helped revive after months of tough talks and execution of ‘prior actions’ that have become the hallmark of the bailouts the Fund has extended to Islamabad in recent years. Hence, a blame game will do no one any good.