Geek government spokesman on Thursday sent ripples through the obscure waters of negotiations over the Greek program, telling reporters that “If the IMF doesn’t participate in the program, then there’s no point in implementing the measures that it (IMF) requested''.
Spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos was referring to austerity measures demanded by creditors for 2019 and 2020 to ensure that fiscal targets are met.
“No one in Europe is asking for these measures,” Tzanakopoulos said, referring to the IMF’s insistence on extra measures, in which in this case means pension cuts in 2019 and an expansion of the tax base, downwards, in 2020.
Moreover, he echoed Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras most recent statement of “… the measures will be ratified, but not implemented if the reasons for which they were passed do not exist.”
