Kiev, Ukraine. Lots of 3 letter organizations creep around Kiev these days, CIA, FBI, DEA, SBU, FSB, BND, but none are more feared by Petro Poroshenko, than one; IMF. Who truly has life or death powers over the out of control corrupt Kiev junta.
The mission of the International Monetary Fund arrived in Ukraine and will work until May 25, reported a representative of the Ukrainian office of the IMF on May 16. Among the issues that the IMF mission intends to raise with the Poroshenko Administration are corruption, pension reform, changes in tax and customs policy, progress in VAT refund and budget implementation.
The last time the IMF mission worked in Ukraine was in the first half of November 2016. On April 3, 2017. At that time Ukraine was given a tranche of $1 billion.IMF Spokesman Gerry Rice said that this year Ukraine can receive up to three more tranches of the loan from the IMF for a total of about 4.4 billion dollars. He also noted that this was conditional to the implementation of the reforms stipulated by the cooperation program, that Poroshenko has so far failed to meet.
In Washington, the representative said the main objectives of the program for the next few months were getting a corruption court up and functional, comprehensive pension reform, progress in privatization, creation of a market for selling farm land to major foreign corporations and again a serious determined fight against corruption, which was an important element in this program, not met previously, which is why Ukraine did not get the entire IMF payout.
According to the National Bank, until the end of the year, Ukraine expects to receive 4.5 billion US dollars from the IMF and 1.3 billion from the European Commission. Before the end of 2019, Ukraine must pay 12.8 billion dollars’ worth of foreign debt.
Of course no plan is in place to cover the missing 5.8 billion dollars from the Ukrainian National Bank, suspected of being funneled offshore by former bank head Valera Gontareva who suddenly resigned, under investigation by both the US FBI and Ukrainian NABU detectives.
In March 2015, a 4-year, $17.5 billion Extended “Fund Me Facility” was approved between the IMF and Ukraine. Together with the current tranche, the IMF has provided Ukraine about 8.38 billion dollars under this program.
The program is portrayed on the official IMF website as, “We aim to put the economy on the path to recovery, restore external sustainability, strengthen public finances, and support economic growth by advancing structural and governance reforms, while protecting the most vulnerable.” But the most vulnerable in today’s Ukraine continue to never see one penny of the IMF funds, as they are always gone with the wind upon arrival.