CAIRO: Egypt has asked the International Monetary Fund for $3.2 billion in support, a government minister said Monday, as the country’s interim Cabinet seeks to fill a budget gap pushed wider by almost a year of political and economic turmoil. The previous army-backed government turned down an offer of $3 billion in financial assistance from the IMF last June but since then the country’s funding problems have worsened and its currency has come under heavy pressure.

“We have asked the IMF for $3.2 billion in support,” Planning and International Cooperation Minister Faiza Abu al-Naga told reporters at the start of talks with fund officials visiting Cairo.

She said an IMF delegation would return to Egypt in late January. IMF regional director Masood Ahmad said many technical details of an agreement must still be resolved and this week’s visit was to “hear and understand the Egyptian situation.”

Foreign financial investors have given Egypt a wide berth since street demonstrations erupted a year ago, forcing the government to rely on local banks for funds, a situation that has forced up yields on treasury bills and bonds to levels that some economists say are unsustainable.

The new negotiations take place as the ruling military council tries to fend off criticism of its temporary rule from pro-democracy groups and grapple with social tension caused by poverty and rising prices.

The new Cabinet nominated in November needs to cut spending but risks further angering a population that depends on state subsidies and whose hopes for an improvement in living standards were raised by the uprising that ousted President Hosni Mubarak.

Abu al-Naga said the projected budget deficit was now 144 billion Egyptian pounds ($23.85 billion), or 8.7 percent of estimated gross domestic product. That compares to an official estimate for the previous year of 9.5 percent.
The IMF money would be disbursed over 18 months, she said.

Without a financial lifeline from the IMF, it is unlikely that Egypt will be able to tap an international pool of aid agreed by donors in France last year for countries in the Middle East and North Africa, such as Egypt and Tunisia.
Yet there is no certainty that an agreement can be reached.

The IMF has insisted that any deal with Egypt needs to have broad political support, meaning it would be transferred easily into the hands of a successor government.
The Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist movement that has emerged from a parliamentary election as Egypt’s strongest political force, says that it would consider supporting a deal for emergency IMF aid, providing that there are no conditions attached.