'Ecuador Won't Comply With IMF Conditionality' Candidate Says

The Socialist presidential candidate Andres Arauz said that he will not comply with the policy conditionalities imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) if he is elected president of Ecuador in February 2021.

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"We will not comply with the IMF agreement due to the format in which its current conditionalities have been defined," the 35-year-old economist stated.

Three weeks ago, the "Union for Hope" candidate met with the IMF staff and expressed that he would not implement policies that worsen the current situation of the Ecuadorian population.

“We are going to reestablish macroeconomic balances gradually over time. However, that's not the priority right now. Our priority is to serve households, which are suffering an economic crisis that has generated massive unemployment and risk of lack of food," he explained.

Arauz also mentioned that Ecuador will only be able to pay its financial obligations if the resources got from external debt are channeled to strengthening the internal economy. 

The leftist candidate indicated that the cost of structural adjustment should fall on the higher-income groups which "have been avoiding taxes and foreignizing the economy. He also explained that the Central Bank should not be an almost private institution which does not respond to the Executive branch's economic policy guidelines.

On October 1, the IMF approved a US$6.5 billion loan for Ecuador. In exchange for this, however, this multilateral institution would be demanding public budget cuts and an increase in the value-added tax, among other things.

The details of the agreement reached with President Lenin Moreno's administration have not been fully disclosed to the public so far.