"The Vice President of the World Bank has said that Pakistan needs to undertake rapid adjustments and reforms to avert an economic crisis." "I would disregard what he has to say."
"Well, these guys are considered experts by all our ministry officials with each ministry vying for their dollars that don't come cheap by the way." "They maybe experts but these are the guys whose advice the former government was relying on and these are the same experts who gave the former government a clean bill of health and kept extolling the virtues of the economic policies of the likes of Salman Shah and Shaukat Aziz and guess what: we have an energy crisis, we have a water shortage, we have high rates of inflation. True we have some roads and some agricultural projects but shouldn't these international financial institutions have tried to focus the attention of our economic mismanagers on more critical areas."
"Promotions in these international institutions are linked to greater lending and so all they care about is increased lending to countries like Pakistan and let's be honest the Musharraf government relied on foreign borrowing to increase its popularity, not that it succeeded but that seemed to have been their strategy."
"So what do you suggest to the new government?" "Senior political figures must keep away from these international bureaucrats, however senior they maybe like a vice president. Negotiators from the Pakistani side must be from the bureaucracy and must engage in getting the best deal possible and if these institutions insist on conditionalities that we cannot endorse then it maybe preferable not to borrow from them."
"So you reckon secretary level meetings must take place with these visitors."
"Yes, let's be more like India: no meetings granted to international bureaucrats by the political leadership of the country and refuse to accept conditionalities that are considered against national interest. It is preferable to go to the international market place..." "But these institutions give cheaper credit."
"Nope, they don't. The bulk of the money is at the market rate and if that comes attached with conditionalities."
"I see what you mean."
"And as I said before, countries like India and even Central Asia don't allow their heads of government or even finance ministers to meet with these international bureaucrats."
"So no publicity for them when they come on a visit..." "I would say so because publicity never does the government of the day any good, but in the past Shaukat Aziz with no real powers used to meet with them...I do hope this practice is not continued by this government." "I hope so too."
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