A review mission of the IMF will arrive in Sri Lanka this week hoping to shed light into how the government plans to increase public sector wages although not allocated in the Vote-on-Account interim budget.

Brian Aitken, Mission Chief for Sri Lanka of the IMF’s Asia and Pacific Department, is shortly expected in the island leading a review mission for the third disbursement of the US$ 2.6 billion standby facility.

Central Bank officials said the third tranche amounting to US$ 329.4 million could be expected before January.

IMF Residence Representative in Sri Lanka Dr. Koshy Mathai told journalists last morning that the IMF programme does not prevent government from raising public sector wages but said the Vote-on-Account was not clear on this either.

"We do not have an assessment of how this could affect the budget but this is something the review mission would discuss with the government. The government has not communicated anything to us (on this matter) so far but we are sure there would not be an undue deviance from the fiscal targets," Dr. Mathai said.