THE International Monetary Fund said yesterday it will close its Brazilian office, a day after receiving harsh criticism from Economy Minister Paulo Guedes over its forecasts for Latin America’s biggest economy.

The IMF said it would close its office in Brasilia when the current country representative’s mandate expires on June 30, 2022.

The move came after Guedes, far-right President Jair Bolsonaro’s ultra-liberal economy guru, said the IMF was overly pessimistic in its forecasts on Brazil and was no longer welcome.

“They can go take a walk,” he said on Wednesday.

“They were here forecasting (Brazil’s economy) would contract by 9.7% (in 2020) and Britain’s would contract by 4%. In the end, we contracted by 4%, and Britain by 9.7%,” he said.

He also accused IMF officials in the country of being more interested in “football and feijoada” – a meat-and-bean stew that is one of Brazil’s most famous attractions – than in helping the economy.

The IMF opened its office in Brazil in 1999, when the country turned to the Washington institution for financing to help get out of an economic crisis.

That program ended in 2005.

The IMF said it had maintained the office to “facilitate dialogue,” but Guedes said that was no longer needed.

“They’ve been here long enough. There was a lot of imbalance in the relationship,” he said.

Guedes and Bolsonaro have been at pains to shore up confidence in Brazil’s recession-hit economy as the president heads toward elections next October with his popularity at an all-time low.

Bolsonaro has alarmed investors by maneuvering to break Brazil’s constitutional spending cap in order to fund big social spending, a move condemned as economic populism by critics.

Guedes insists the pessimism is unwarranted and that the Bolsonaro administration will leave a stronger economy than it inherited. – AFP, December 17, 2021.