French FM leads the race for IMF chief post

New York: The nominations for the IMF chief post closes on Friday, with French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde leading the race even as consensus remains elusive amongst emerging nations on support for a particular candidate.

Apart from Lagarde, Mexican central bank governor Agustin Carstens and Kazakhstan's central bank governor Grigory Marchenkois are in the fray for the IMF Managing Director's post which fell vacant after the ignominious exit of Dominique Strauss-Kahn last month.

Despite increased focus on having a merit-based and transparent process for choosing International Monetary Fund's next chief, developed and developing are split over having another European at the helm.

Traditionally, the IMF chief has been an European and the World Bank head an American. The executive board of the IMF is expected to choose the new Managing Director by June 30.

India did not commit its support for Lagarde's candidature when she came calling to the national capital on Tuesday. "There is no assurance (on supporting Christine Lagarde). We are working on a consensus," Mukherjee had said.

Carstens is in India to drum up support for his IMF chief bid. On India supporting Carstens, Mukherjee had earlier said that he is a competent person.

"... The Fund's Executive Board has adopted a procedure that allows the selection of the next Managing Director to take place in an open, merit-based, and transparent manner," IMF Executive Board's Dean Shakour Shaalan had said on May 20.

Earlier, the BRICS bloc - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - had issued a joint statement in Washington questioning the methodology of selection of IMF chief on the basis of nationality.

"The convention that the selection of the Managing Director is made, in practice, on the basis of nationality undermines the legitimacy of the fund," Executive Directors representing the BRICS had said in a statement.

The multilateral lending agency has 187 members and majority voting share is with US. Strauss-Kahn put in his papers last month in the wake of sexual assault charges.