Moldovan PM meets team of European Commission's ECFIN Directorate General

Chisinau, 17 February /MOLDPRES/ – Prime Minister Pavel Filip met today with representatives of ECFIN Mission Directorate General within European Commission, on a visit to the Republic of Moldova. The prime minister welcomed ECFIN team in Chisinau, coinciding with IMF mission visit, describing it as extremely significant, the government’s communication and protocol department has reported.  

On this occasion, the prime minister expressed gratitude to the European Commission decision of 13 January 2017 to suggest Moldova a macro – financial assistance (MFA) amounting to 100 million euros for 2017 – 2018. Pavel Filip said that the decision was very important for Moldova and voiced the firm determination of the Government to continue dialogue with ECFIN Mission Directorate General in the European Commission to ensure allocation of MFA in time.

Similarly, Pavel Filip catalogued the conditions to be imposed by the European Union and international financial institutions as a support tool for the government since the reform agenda being ambitious and often non-populist. Namely, the need to respect conditions will help the government accountability at all levels of decision and will facilitate their awareness by the society.

"The reforms are ambitiously painful, but we are determined to implement them. We have a good communication to make possible the explanation of the need and impact of these reforms, as to colleagues in Parliament, population, so to development partners," Pavel Filip said.

Among the priority reforms, prime minister highlighted reforms of the central and local public administration, primary care, public health, hospital, employment, public procurement system and revising the Labour Code.

At their turn, the Mission representatives referred upon five key sectors to be imposed conditions for reforms, which are: financial sector, public sector governance, energy, anticorruption, business and investment climate.

MFA is an exceptional EU instrument in case of crisis response that can benefit partner countries neighbouring the EU. The financial assistance is intended to supplement the IMF program, approved on 07 November 2016.