adminATHENS. — Eurozone finance ministers are “losing patience” with Greece, Eurogroup president Jeroen Dijsselbloem told a Greek daily as the government unveiled its next budget yesterday without concluding an EU-IMF audit.
The first details of the budget said that the deep recession in the economy would end next year with 0,6 percent growth.
But Dijsselbloem had told the Ta Nea daily after a lecture in The Hague on Wednesday that “many finance ministers of the eurozone are starting to lose patience,” the paper reported.
A statement issued by the International Monetary Fund early yesterday said that auditors from the IMF, the European Central Bank and the European Commission had concluded their latest visit to Greece to review progress on the country’s economic programme, without reaching a full agreement.
Such audits determine whether or not Greece receives the next slice of rescue funding.
The IMF said that the discussions had been “productive” on the policies “that could serve as a basis” for completion of the review.
It said that “good progress has been made, but a few issues remain outstanding. Talks would continue from the headquarters of the three creditor bodies and the auditors would return to Athens “early in December,” the statement said.
The budget being published yesterday signals slim growth in the Greek economy after six years in a row of biting recession. But the budget is likely to require revision soon as Greek officials have yet to agree with the country’s creditors on how to close a looming fiscal gap next year.
The troika predicts the 2014 fiscal gap will exceed US$2 billion, while the Greek government estimates the sum to be slightly more than 500 million euros.
Discussions are also stumbling on the issue of a new property tax, possible new pension cuts as well as layoffs in the state sector and the slow pace of privatisation. The EU-IMF fiscal audit, necessary to unblock a US$1,4 billion instalment of financial aid, is now expected to drag on until Christmas.
“Greece still has plenty of work to do,” Dijsselbloem told Ta Nea, noting that the EU-IMF talks in Athens were focusing on Greece’s “progress — or rather, lack of progress — on its commitments.”
The draft budget tabled in October had foreseen a sliver of growth of 0,6 percent in 2014, after a four-percent economic contraction in 2013.
It also predicted a surplus excluding debt service charges of 2,8 billion euros or 1,6 percent of GDP.
Greece lurched into recession when the global economic crisis hit in 2008 and by 2010 rising borrowing costs on its massive debt forced Athens to seek a bailout from the EU and IMF.
Two bailouts, worth up to 240 billion euros plus about 100 billion euros in a debt write off, helped stave off a feared breakup of the euro and kept the Greek state financially afloat. — AFP.
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