IMF appreciates govt commitment to governance, corruption assessment – Business

A mission of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that recently visited Pakistan to evaluate the country’s governance has said it appreciated the government’s commitment to such assessments, it emerged on Saturday.

A technical mission of the IMF was in Pakistan earlier this month to scrutinise the judicial and regulatory system as part of the ongoing $7 billion Extended Fund Facility (EFF) to address governance and corruption vulnerabilities.

During the visit, a delegation led by Joel Turkewitz discussed judicial performance, governance and reforms in a meeting with Chief Justice of Pakistan Yahya Afridi.

In a recent statement posted on its website, the IMF recalled that its scoping mission visited Islamabad from February 6 to 14 “to lay the groundwork for a Governance and Corruption Diagnostic Assessment (GCD) at the request” of the government.

’The IMF appreciates the commitment of the Government of Pakistan to this exercise and looks forward to continuing our collaboration,“ it stated.

The IMF further announced that its scoping team for the GCD assessment will “return to Pakistan later in this year to continue gathering information and exploring opportunities to strengthen governance and integrity, and economic outcomes in preparation for the eventual assessment”.

The Fund noted that the mission’s focus was to preliminarily assess governance and corruption vulnerabilities across six core state functions.

“These include fiscal governance, central bank governance and operations, financial sector oversight, market regulation, rule of law, and anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML-CFT).”

During its visit, the team engaged with the Finance Division, the Federal Board of Revenue, the State Bank of Pakistan, the Auditor General of Pakistan, the Securities & Exchange Commission of Pakistan, the Ministry of Law & Justice, and the Supreme Court, the IMF said.

“In addition, the IMF team met with a range of other stakeholders, including business associations, civil society organisations, and international development partners.”

Pakistan is expecting two more policy-level IMF staff missions till March — one for talks on more than $1bn additional financing for climate resilience and another for a review of the ongoing $7bn loan programme.