AFP and John Otini

The International Monetary Fund’s board of directors met Tuesday following charges that its director, Kristalina Georgieva, pressured staff in 2017 when she was the World Bank CEO to change data in a key ranking report to paint China in a more positive light.

The board did not announce any immediate decision and said it would meet again “soon.”

“The IMF’s Executive Board met today for an initial briefing from the Ethics Committee on the matter related to Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva’s alleged role in the World Bank’s Doing Business 2018 as described in the Investigation’s Report,” the IMF said in a statement.

It added that the board “emphasized the importance it attached to conducting a thorough, objective, and timely review and agreed to meet again soon for a further discussion.”

Denies allegation

The board had already met with Georgieva, who denies the charges, last Thursday and Friday, immediately after the investigation was made public.

The World Bank discontinued its flagship Doing Business report after an investigation alleged that the bank’s top officials pushed their staff to manipulate data affecting the ranking of nations such as China in order to get more funding.

The top dogs at the center of the investigation include then World Bank chief executive officer Georgieva, now managing director of the IMF, and then World Bank President Jim Yong Kim.

“After data irregularities on Doing Business 2018 and 2020 were reported internally in June 2020, World Bank management paused the next Doing Business report and initiated a series of reviews and audits of the report and its methodology,” the bank said in a press statement.

The report was a key benchmark by and has a strong bearing on foreign direct investment. 

Kenya last year improved five places to number 56 out of a total of 190 countries and position three in Africa buty the report has been the subject of discussions both inside and outside over the integrity of the data used in the ranking. 

The results of the investigation released last Thursday concluded that senior bank leaders including Ms. Georgieva were involved in pressuring economists to improve China’s 2018 ranking.