An announcement by the Minister of Finance in the Assembly recently went unnoticed or at least not commented on. It was the announcement to the members that Government was to seek help from the IMF.
Nothing in that you may add, but there has been no debate in public or otherwise about the consequences of allowing the IMF in our daily lives. It is like allowing a dog in a chicken coop, the result is total devastation.
What exactly is the IMF? It is an organization dominated by the industralised nations, set up after the second world war to help countries cope with economic difficulties. It has, however, been taken over by idealists and dogma and its solution is always the same. This has been applied in many countries across the world over the last 30 years with the same degree of failure, from most of the South American countries to Russia via Poland and the Far East. All have seen their economies fail miserably, all have had dramatic increases in poverty and deprivation and have given rise to the super rich while the majority live in appalling conditions. So much so that the IMF has been kicked out of most of these countries, and finds it difficult today to meet its large wage bill, its main client is Turkey who has most of the Us$80 billion loaned out, compared to almost five times that amount of loan four years ago.
There must be a reason why these countries with a long association with the IMF decided to bail out. So why is the IMF hated so much by such a large part of the developing world. And why like in our case it is being pushed by consultants with no responsibility and no debate. The IMF works on the principle of Shock therapy, on the principle that there should not be public debate as more than likely all the proposed economic measures would be rejected out of hand. Why are they so scared? Why do they pretend that they and they alone have the only solution to our problems? Let’s look at the standard measures, which most than likely is being debated at this very moment to apply to our economy
WHAT DOES IMF MEANS FOR SEYCHELLES?
Devaluation – a must in any scheme, in our case dramatically increasing the cost of everything, as we import most of our needs, increase in rice, oil and all the basics.
Increase in interest rates- By what amount only the IMF knows. Remember that most of us are now home owners, encouraged to borrow to buy, now we need to find out more. But where do we get it from?
Reduce government expenditure- All social programs to be eliminated, all government help to be cut, no more festival Creole, that has already started with the fuel subsidy for fisherman, the only funds available are for expensive consultants.
No subsidy on transport and health- Not only will we pay for everything like health and education for our children but we will also have to pay more for everything. We are now going to pay for what we never used to pay for either.
Freeze on all wage increases- We will have to eat less, spend less and barely be able to survive.We will have to open our borders to all who wants to come to our country and allow foreigners to buy land wherever and whenever they want and take all the foreign currency overseas.
No protection for local businesses- Allow Carrefour to come and put all the small merchants, and the larger ones for that matter out of business, then increase their prices as they wish and hold the population to ransom, again another advise of the French now entrenched at the Ministry of Finance.
More poverty- For our society, where social equality has been an aim, largely achieved, where poverty is largely eradicated, where people have enough to eat, where education is free for everyone and one of the best in the region, where cheap transport has allowed movement of labor, implementing the IMF program will be a disaster. It will take us back to the colonial era where instead of being subjected to her majesty’s rule, we will now be subjected to the IMF’s rule and the French prejudices instead and beholden to big businesses.
Now you understand why no one is allowed to debate this question, ask the Chileans, the Argentineans , the Russians, most of the African countries and many many more how the IMF measures ruined their lives, and that despite original promises that the medicine will work it never did and never will either.
Now more than ever before we need to unite to hold back the IMF tide. We need to know what the consequences are and we need to demand to be part of the debate as well.It concerns our future, the consultants come and go and are not held responsible for their actions. We will pay for it, our children will pay for it, and so will their children.
The IMF has been held at bay all that time, despite desperately knocking on the door., Today we need to find a champion to defend us, the opposition is misguided when it says we have no choice, we have and plenty, ask those that have booted out the IMF after years of hardship. Jacqueline Moustache-Belle here is a topic for your fantastic face-a –face program. What does IMF means for Seychelles?