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Oman says will not join single Gulf currency

KUWAIT CITY - Oman’s central bank governor Homud al-Zidjali said on Wednesday that the sultanate had decided not to take part in a planned single currency for Arab states in the Gulf.

“Our decision is not to participate in the Gulf monetary union... because we do not want to restrict our monetary and fiscal policies at present,” Zidjali said at a banking conference in Kuwait.

Oman told its Gulf Cooperation Council partners last year that it was unable to meet the legislative and technical requirements for monetary union by the target date of 2010, but would join at a later date.

“At present we will not join. Later when the single currency comes into existence, then maybe,” Zidjali later told reporters.

He said Oman believes that meeting the GCC monetary union criteria may have a negative impact on its development plan.

Besides Oman, the GCC groups Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.

GCC leaders decided at their summit in 2001 to launch their monetary union and single currency in 2010, but economists have cast doubt over their ability to meet the date especially after the Omani move and Kuwait’s decision on Sunday to peg the dinar to a basket of currencies instead of the dollar.