The head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission in Mozambique said yesterday that the Mozambican government had banned the release of the technical report on the outlines of the financial assistance, which is usually released when the program is presented.

"The authorities asked to make changes to the initial report, in a process that is provided for in the IMF's internal regulations, the authorities did not accept publication, so what will be published is the staff report of the first evaluation of the program in the next few days," said Álvaro Piris at the press conference to present the evaluation.

"Our policy is clear, the publication of technical reports is presumed, but voluntary, so ultimately the authorities can withhold their consent to the publication of a report on the country, and they have done so, which, I admit, is not very common," replied the IMF mission chief when asked by Bloomberg about the lack of this report.

The document that the Mozambican government has banned from being released generally includes a letter signed by the authorities, usually the head of government, the finance minister and the governor of the central bank, detailing the main reason for the request for financial assistance.

Generally, this letter is accompanied by an IMF report on the country's needs and another government document, in which the authorities present the economic situation and explain what they intend to do to solve the problem or difficulty that prompted the request for help from the IMF. Both documents are several dozen pages long and provide a detailed account of the country's financial situation.

"The authorities expressly didn't want it to be published the way it was going to be, I can say that I don't think it's an economically important issue, it's more a matter of internal process and differences of view," said Álvaro Piris quoted by Lusa, refusing to say specifically what the problem was.

"I don't think it's in the interest of the international community or foreign investors in the country," he said, trying to downplay the ban on releasing the documents that form the request for financial assistance, including the Debt Sustainability Analysis, which will only be published in the second evaluation of the program, in 2023.

The IMF returned to Mozambique this year, after suspending budgetary aid due to the hidden debt scandal in 2016, and a financial assistance program worth 456 million dollars is underway, aimed at creating budgetary margin for government investments in human capital, climate adaptation and infrastructure.

"The program's performance criteria, indicative targets and structural benchmarks at the end of June 2022 have been met, the monetary policy outlook and the proactive tightening since early 2021 are appropriate to deal with the expected rise in inflation," writes the IMF in the note that reports on the board's approval of the first review of the Extended Credit Facility (ECF).

The approval of the first revision to the three-year program, approved in May this year, represents an immediate disbursement of 59.2 million dollars, out of the total of 456 million dollars included in the financial adjustment program, of which Mozambique has already received around 150 million dollars.