"Ideologically the gap is narrowing with the International Monetary Fund, so said the Finance Minister?"
"For your information, ideologically the gap between the Fund and any debtor government is non-existent because on paper at least all governments want prosperity as well as alleviation of poverty, the difference lies in the policies and their implementation."
"I agree the gap is in differences in the non-ideological arena."
"And non-ideological maybe defined as specific time bound policy implementation; and need I add it's these non-ideological specifics that form the content of the bailout package conditions."
"And while we are on the subject of the government's major achievements in seeking assistance, the finance minister has acknowledged to a section of the media that the UAE may not give us deferred oil payment facility for three years - and that means the current account deficit for the current year would be 3.2 billion dollars higher and..."
"Why? What did he do or say to the Emiratis' for them to withdraw this facility? Oh, and is the remaining 1 billion dollar loan to be parked in the State Bank of Pakistan for one year still on?"
"I am not sure but I would urge the PTI administration's key ministers to take a crash course on diplomacy - they must never, I repeat never ever, publicly provide details of assistance from countries shy of letting the world know the total value of their assistance to any country and at what conditions ...."
"That's no fun!"
"Fun or no fun it is good policy. The previous two civilian administrations knew this basic diplomatic premise when dealing with the Arabs and..."
"But what did the PTI administration do, or not do, for UAE to withdraw that deferred oil facility?"
"I don't know but you have to give the finance minister some credit, no, not for his amendments finance bill 1 and 2, no, not for his resistance to launch macroeconomic stabilization policies but his acknowledgement that the oil facility is withdrawn..."
"I know of some instances where he was economical with the truth. And I have documents to prove it."
"Give the guy a break for Pete's sake, he is up against a wall and I don't mean the state of the economy he inherited."
"Ha ha, ha, that's certainly true."