Egypt asks IMF to loan $4.8 billion

CAIRO - Reuters

Egypt’s PM Qandil announces the country needs an IMF loan for reforms.

Egypt has finished revising an economic reform plan needed for a $4.8 billion IMF (International Monetary Fund) loan, the prime minister said on Feb. 13, but he did not say when the government might return to negotiations with the fund.

Egypt’s government signed a preliminary agreement for the urgently needed loan in November, but the formal signing was delayed after political turmoil forced it to postpone a number of austerity measures necessary for a deal.

Prime Minister Hisham Kandil said the government had now finished drawing up a revised reform program, basing changes on recommendations from a national dialogue that had been held with different interest groups.

“The new revised program has been finished,” he said in a televised interview with MBC Masr, without giving further details.

Kandil said the government was in touch with the IMF by email, but when he was asked whether it was true there were difficulties in getting loan negotiations restarted, he said: “Definitely ... (But) we won’t go back to zero.”

Egypt opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei on Feb. 12 called for a national consensus to secure the loan and save the country from economic collapse.