NAfter only a few months in office, the head of the Turkish central bank was dismissed. Naci Agbal will be replaced by Sahap Kavcioglu, a former member of the ruling party, according to a presidential decree published on Friday evening. The layoff came a day after the central bank raised the key interest rate to 19 percent in an attempt to contain inflation in Turkey.
Former finance minister Agbal had only taken over the post in November. Under his predecessor, the central bank ignored calls for a rate hike. Instead, it lowered the key rate several times under pressure from President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. He repeatedly referred to rate hikes as the “mother of all evil”. Experts blame Erdogan’s stance for many of Turkey’s economic problems.
Kavcioglu is already the fourth central bank governor since July 2019. The Turkish lira has lost around 15 percent of its value against the dollar since Agbal’s appointment in November.
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