Devaluation not an option says RPP as chaos over Belka's absence grows

The chaos following Finance Minister Marek Belka's resignation is getting out of control. Moreover, Deputy Finance Minister Halina Wasilewska Trenkner announced yesterday that the z3oty's devaluation was one of the proposals presented to the president of the National Bank of Poland (NBP) by Belka a few weeks ago. Apparently, the government and Central Bank are only ev aluating the costs of such an operation. Even though Wasilewska Trenkner has strongly underlined that nothing has yet been decided concerning deval uation, panic has spread throughout the market and again some foreign investors have left Poland. This has resulted in a further weakening of the Polish currency. "There will be no devaluation. As the z3oty is floated , currency parity has been wound up so there is no benchmark against which we could devaluate the z3oty," said Dariusz Rosati of the Monetary Policy Council (RPP). Denials by RPP members and other officials have prevented a deeper drop in the value of the z3oty, but have not averted the threat of financial crisis. (Prawo i Gospodarka, pp. 1, 4) M.M.