Lagarde in lead as Manuel opts out

Lisbon/ Johannesburg - Africa backs French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde as next head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), her Republic of Congo counterpart Matata Mapon said at a meeting of the African Development Bank on Friday.

"We are encouraged by your vision of the IMF in the world," he told Lagarde, who had attended the meeting in Lisbon to lobby for African support.

Mapon, speaking on behalf of African finance ministers, said her candidacy met the requirements and he was "reassured" that Lagarde would be "benevolent" towards Africa if she is appointed.

"We wish you very good luck," he said.

Lagarde was the leading candidate to be the next managing director of the IMF as nominations closed on Friday for a successor to Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who resigned after being charged with the attempted rape of a New York hotel maid.

Earlier Trevor Manuel said  he was not running for the post.
 
“It is important to understand that decisions take place in the context of world politics. Against that backdrop, I have decided not to avail myself,” Manuel, a respected former finance minister, told a news conference.

Manuel said it would be unfortunate if the next IMF head was from Europe. "It would be “most unfortunate if we end up with a European who is bound by the EU”, he said.

More could have been done to persuade Europeans that the next IMF chief should come from an emerging country, Manuel said.

"I think a lot more could be done, a lot more should have been done. A lot more should have been done to persuade Europeans that this birthright is not a birthright that should find resonance in an institution as important as the IMF," Manuel said.

Manuel's ruling himself out of the race makes Lagarde an even firmer favourite, although the threat of a judicial inquiry remains.

Emerging market powers like Russia, India and China have declared they want an end to Europe’s grip on the top job at the international lender, calling time on a pact that puts the IMF in European hands and the World Bank under American leadership.
 
The United States and Europe hold 48% of votes at the IMF, emerging nations just 12%.
 
Manuel, who handled the economy deftly for a decade, has long been touted as an ideal developing world candidate and many had seen him winning more support than the only other declared rival to Lagarde, Mexican Central Bank chief Agustin Carstens, whose policy views are seen as too conservative by many of his emerging market peers.
 
Adept negotiator

Lagarde, an adept negotiator with hands-on experience in the eurozone’s debt crisis, is seen as the clear favourite despite a legal investigation into her role in a 2008 arbitration payout that will hang over her candidacy.
 
A top French court on Friday put off until July 8 its decision on whether to open a formal inquiry into allegations brought by opposition left-wing deputies that she abused her authority in approving a €285m payout to a businessman friend of President Nicolas Sarkozy.

A French finance ministry official told Reuters the legal process was proceeding normally and Lagarde earlier told reporters in Lisbon, where she attended the African Development Bank’s annual meeting, that she was confident about the outcome.
 
She has denied any misconduct in the case and told the daily Le Parisien in comments published on Friday that if an inquiry goes ahead she would only be called upon as a witness and not have to defend herself in court.
 
Lagarde has flown to Brazil, India and China to tout her merits for the IMF job, and carries on her tour to Saudi Arabia and Egypt this weekend. On Thursday she spent an hour tweeting with the general public over her candidacy.

Brics still divided

The African Union said on Thursday it wanted to see a non-European in the job, but emerging market powers have failed to coalesce behind one candidate to challenge Europe’s traditional grip on the job.
 
The fund will name its new managing director on June 30.
 
Frenchman Dominique Strauss-Kahn quit the post in May over charges that he tried to rape a New York hotel maid.
 
Four of the IMF’s 10 managing directors since 1946 have been French but Lagarde, 55, would be the first woman in the job.

A medal-winning former synchronised swimmer and high-flying corporate lawyer, she has played a key role in Europe’s battle to recover from economic crisis and is France’s G20 negotiator on economic issues as it holds the year-long presidency.
 
Carstens has an economics PhD from the University of Chicago, a haven for proponents of deregulation and laissez-faire economics.