IMF dictation

Former US assistant secretary of the treasury for economic policy Dr Paul Craig in a recent article titled: ‘The West is reduced to looting itself’, has penned the methods employed by rich nations to loot the people of Third World countries and how financial aid by the IMF is being used to make these countries slaves.

Third World countries are enticed into taking foreign loans to implement a Western-presented plan to collect sufficient tax revenues to service the IMF loans. Seldom, if ever, does this happen. These plans result in the country becoming indebted beyond its foreign currency earnings. Here the IMF steps in to pay the bank creditors, with stringent measures of austerity and privatisation to repay the IMF. Political leaders are threatened or bribed. Greece, Portugal and Italy are countries whose economies have been destroyed this way. Unfortunately, that fate is awaiting Pakistan – because our leadership and the government can no longer say ‘no’ to the IMF’s dictates.

Hamidullah Khan

Islamabad