The Guess-a-thon of who will be sitting around the cabinet table (it really should be a game show at this point) was the talk in the airwaves last night. We have chapter-and-verse in Speed Round, and the Talking Heads added little to our base of knowledge, so here’s the rest of it:

The IMF delegation due to check up on the health of the Ismail government’s economic reform program is set to arrive in March and not February as previously announced, Deputy Finance Minister Ahmed Kouchouk told Hona Al Assema’s Lamees Al Hadidi. The delegation will determine whether Egypt will receive the second payment of the USD 12 bn facility, Kouchouk explained, pointing out that Egypt’s budget estimates and the IMF’s expectations are largely in sync.

Kouchouk then discussed how attractive Egypt has become to global capital, noting that in the past three months, we’ve seen 25% growth in exports to USD 1.5 bn, USD 500 mn in foreign investment in the EGX, and USD 2 bn worth of T-bills being bought. FDI this year could close at about USD 6 bn, he suggested. Lamees and Kouchouk were later joined via phone by Finance Minister Amr El Garhy, who again emphasized that inflation should slow in the coming months and adding that the inflationary spike following the float was higher than expected.

You can watch the full El Garhy / Kouchouk / Lamees interview here, runtime: 30:31.

In other non-cabinet speculation news, Kol Youm’s Amr Adib was ecstatic that he will interview football megastar Lionel Messi on Wednesday at 6 pm CLT (watch, runtime: 2:52). Messi will be in town to promote the Tour n’ Cure hepatitis C medical tourism program launched by Prime Pharma. But that’s not stopping the Health Ministry from taking credit for the whole thing, according to an emailed statement.

Everyone else was on cabinet shuffle watch last night. Yahduth Fi Masr’s Sherif Amer said the tourism and civil aviation will likely merged, and the names suggested for that post are Amr Sedky and Mohamed Wafaa. Sources told Amer that the ministries of antiquities and culture will also be merged, and Ahmed Nawar is expected to head up that post. Hany Suwailam has been suggested for the Ministry of Education, while Mohamed Sultan and Mahmoud El Meteny were reported to be in the running for the Health Minister job.