Upending IMF deal is Sri Lanka’s biggest threat, President says

Sri Lanka’s president said reopening talks with the International Monetary Fund over a bailout program would represent the biggest threat to the island nation’s economy, hitting back at his opponents who have pledged fresh dialogue with the lender. 

Wickremesinghe, 75, brokered the $3 billion IMF loan that helped stabilize the island nation’s economy after an unprecedented economic crisis in 2022 sent inflation spiraling, wiped out family savings and led to street riots that ousted the previous leader. The austerity measures and tax hikes that followed the bailout have dented Wickremesinghe’s popularity with voters as he seeks another term in office. “I’ve been upfront with them. I’ve not been promising them things I can’t do,” he said, responding to criticism of the tough measures taken. “I said it’s going to be difficult before it gets better.”

The president has been campaigning on his record of bringing stability to the country. His government also negotiated a debt restructuring with creditors like China and private bondholders after a historic default two years ago.

Wickremesinghe is in a three-way race against Anura Kumara Dissanayake, a leftist politician, and opposition leader Sajith Premadasa in Saturday’s election. Both contenders have promised to renegotiate the IMF deal to help Sri Lankans cope with rising costs that followed the bailout. 

Investors say that would be risky for the economy and financial markets. Sri Lankan stocks have slumped 13% from a May peak, while the nation’s dollar bonds are headed for their worst quarter in two years. The rupee has slipped more than 1% this month.

The 2023 deal with the IMF promised relief to Sri Lanka in exchange for debt restructuring, an overhaul in governance and other targets. Even with that deal in place, there is nothing barring a re-opening of discussions with the lender over the methods by which the IMF’s targets are met, said Nishan de Mel, executive director at Verite Research, a Colombo-based think tank. 

“There is no book of laws that says this is the only way that this can be done,” de Mel said.

Hours away from a hotly contested election, Wickremesinghe was adamant that reopening talks with the IMF was the wrong thing to do.

“As soon as you say you want to renegotiate they will stop the next tranche and you will have no money and all the benefits of the deal vanishes,” the president said. “It is like putting your neck onto the rail.”

Regarding the austerity measures usually attached to multilateral loans, the president said the IMF and others need to be more “sensitive” to the needs of countries in distress. However, a change in approach would require a systemic overhaul of the lenders with developing countries playing a bigger role in the IMF, World Bank and other bodies, he said.

The IMF has said the best chance for Sri Lanka to emerge from its economic crisis lies in achieving the standards agreed to with the lender. Even so, the IMF has said it’s open to different views on how to hit those targets as long as they are “realistic and achievable within the timeframe of the program.”

“It is of course up to the people of Sri Lanka to decide on the outcome in a democratic process,” Peter Breuer, senior mission chief for Sri Lanka, said in a press briefing in June. “There may be different proposals for how to achieve that, and we are willing to listen to different views on how these program objectives can be reached.”