P.M. confident of IDB approval of a budget support loan

In November of 2012 there was a major blow up between GOB and the IDB after Belize’s application for policy-based loans was blocked by the US Treasury. Prime Minister Barrow was infuriated…so much so that he attacked IDB President Luis Alberto Moreno and called him a coward for bowing to the wishes of the US Treasury. But in this post-restructured bond era of good feelings and happy times, the Prime Minister has apparently let bygones be bygones, and feels confident of IDB approval of a budget support loan. We’ll have his comment, with a slight jab at the IDB president, but first we revisit November 2012 when Barrow went ballistic on Moreno.

Prime Minister Dean Barrow [File: November 21st, 2012]

“Well I told him that I thought it amounted to a failure of nerve on his part.  I was very, very clear.  I said that Belize is not disappointed with the decision, it is disgusted and that the responsibility was his and his alone.  I was sure to tell him that his position was in stark contrast to the tremendous amount of work that his staff had done, the tremendous amount of goodwill that we had generated at the level of the staff and at the level of, certainly, the borrowing member countries of the IDB board.  So, he made the ultimate decision and he must bear the ultimate brunt of Belize’s ire.  I don’t know that that will put us anywhere but it’s good to have these things on record and I sure as hell placed it on record.”

Dean Barrow

Prime Minister Dean Barrow

“Ambassador Espat and the FS leave tomorrow for the annual IDB meeting in Panama. I’m just back because I’d been away as you know with Kim so I will be deprived of the opportunity of saying hi to my old friend Luis Alberto Moreno but I’m sure the ambassador and the FS will convey my warmest regards. The point is though that we now expect to resume, or not resume, to press ahead full force with our program with the IDB and we expect going forward that that program will be two-fold that we will continue to get project financing, but that as well we expect a budget support loan from the IDB which can always help with the deficit even though the deficit is manageable. The fact that we have succeeded in achieving sustainable debt restructuring is trigger for an IDB support loan. So I expect the FS and Ambassador Espat to bring back good news in principle. One other aspect – at that meeting the honchos from the OPEC, from OFID…the development arm of OPEC will be having a bilateral meeting with Belize. We want to get unlocked the funds for Southside Poverty Alleviation Phase 2…the social components and again we expect that that meeting in Panama will help to do that.” 

We’ll have an update on the success, or not, of the visit to the IDB annual meeting when Ambassador Espat and Financial Secretary Joe Waight return.