IMF Loans and Pakistan Iftikhar Memon, Wellington, Fl
IMF loans will not help our economy due to the austerity measures that it will demand Pakistan to employ in exchange for the loans. The already tattered social infrastructure will weaken even more and people at the bottom of the ladder will be hurt the most. Having said that without the IMF loans Pakistan’s economy could not possibly jumpstart itself, thus the loans are a necessity. One can only hope that the military regime takes pity on the plight of the poor as opposed to the past governments which only concerned themselves with filling their own coffers and their mismanagement explains why Pakistan needs these loans. Pakistan has the potential but it lacks leadership; let’s hope we see good leadership before it’s too late.
Mahammad Riaz, Santa Fe Springs, CA
IMF loans are designed as a welfare system for the ruling class that is accustomed to free hand outs and in general has no core ethical values regarding work or dignity of Pakistani people as a nation. IMF exploits this and advances loans with the full knowledge that the money is used for personal gains. In a way, IMF breaks the US anticorruption and anti-bribery laws. What is most surprising is the eagerness of the affluent expatriate Pakistani community which rolls out red carpets for politicians, bureaucrats and ex-generals, many of whom are fugitive from law.
Ali Ashraf Khan, Karachi, Pakistan
The IMF and the World Bank are acting as a circarama theater to force the developing nations to mortgage their entire assets with the agents of the Money Mafia and thus establish a World Parliament with one hundred multinational CEO’s as its members to control and drive maximum benefits for this single minority - the Money Mafia. We have already witnessed trailers of what is in the offing in the shape of the Indonesian and Malaysian growth and fall scenario under the so-called sustainable economic development plans and resultant financial collapse. What more is needed for Third World leaders to understand this gimmick. What is needed to offset this adventurism is self-confidence and confidence in the people who will serve as a bulwark in the face of a catastrophe.