Thanks fellas for your assessment of the very misleading report on The
Gambia's adherence to IMF restrictions and their overall economic.  But
despite the level of economic expertise we have among members of this forum,
I am yet to see anyone provide any valuable insight into this report or of
it's implications.  In other words, no one has broken this report down sector
by sector into layman's terms to prove to everyone that these reports can be
cooked plus the boost that this report gives this farce of a regime.  There
have been many instances in the past where certain countries have provided
extremely misleading reports to the International Mafia Federation, as I call
them, just to secure well needed funds or aid.

Ebrima Ceesay's source raised the possibility that the country's reserves are
being tapped to make up for deficits in various sectors of the economy.  More
stable economies with deep reserves occasionally do this to stabilize
currencies and interest rates by boosting the flow of cash and the central
bank's reserves. But, based on the current economic situation, our country is
in no position to do this. I am no economics expert, but I have a deep and
almost justified suspicion that this is happening.  As usual, only the IMF
and so called international bodies seem to be unaware of this fact.  Again,
like Kofi Annan's visit in the aftermath of the student massacre showed,
these international bodies are either oblivious to the facts when being
stared directly in the face by the stone cold truth, or just plain uninformed
and ignorant.  The result is that our people get hurt and the government can
say: "We told you so.  Because we got additional loans, everything is OK."
Meanwhile, people are getting killed, detained and harassed unnecessarily
while our coffers are getting emptied.  And, as usual, it will be all too
late when the rest of the World realizes.  When realization sets in, they
will put a different spin on it.  The NY Times will have this horrific story
of this terribly ugly, almost demon like, African dictator who raped his
country and emptied the coffers before escaping to Morocco with his Arab
wife, ALA Mobutu Sese Sekou.

As KB alluded to in his earlier post, the government's report was
specifically tailored to suit the IMF's demands so that they could receive a
paltry 3.4 million dollars.  Give me a bloody break!  Even some of my friends
are worth more than this puny sum of cash.  It just goes to show the trouble
we are presently embroiled in.  The following statement sums it all up in
regard to the economic performance criteria:

<<The Gambian authorities are to be commended for achieving a broadly
encouraging economic performance over the past one and a half years of the
PRGF arrangement. There has been sustained per capita GDP growth, low
inflation, and some reduction in the fiscal deficit. There were also marked
structural reforms, including progress in privatization and reform of the
financial sector, and a significant reduction and rationalization of the
external tariff system was attained.>>

If you notice, there are no specific numbers attached to this "broadly"
encouraging economic performance that the IMF commends the rogue government
for achieving.  Essentially, this means that, because the criteria for
getting these loans are so lax and broad, any country can receive this aid,
especially the much poorer ones.

Furthermore, in regard to the IMF's claim that The Gambia has achieved marked
structural reforms, their standard of their criteria in this aspect must
again be extremely low.  So the privatization of one business or two is
actually considered as significant progress by the IMF?

In regard to the farcical tariff issue, if my recollection serves me right,
didn't the government arrange some corrupt deal with BIVAC to ensure that
everyone gets a cut of the profits made of tariffs?  Up to a point, where the
issue was raised in parliament.  And yet the IMF's special envoy to our
country still fails to realize this and instead praises the farce of a
government for tariff cuts.  Typical!

How about the growing GDP?  one of my economics teachers in college who was a
major player in World Bank policy actually jokingly said one day that African
countries make up their GDPs because the economic systems are so
disorganized.  Well, on the day he uttered those words I was hurt.  But I
think Gambia's growing GDP can be surely attributed to do this, an
extrapolation of these numbers.  Yes, cooking the books, I say.  So give no
credence to these numbers.  The same applies to the inflation rate and fiscal
deficit.  A really good economist working in conjunction with a good
mathematician can manipulate these figures. If you recall, back in the 80s,
the Gambia's currency was so overvalued that Jawara floated the currency with
horrible effects on the common citizen.  Well, the Dalasi is more over valued
today.

The second review is a bit closer to the truth since it talks about the need
to enhance transparency and good governance without really going into great
detail about what constitutes good governance or what aspects of transparency
they want improved.  Nevertheless, the fact that government does not adhere
to the principles of transparency should concern them greatly.  The IMF
relies on a government's transparency for their yearly assessments.

Finally, the terrible groundnut situation is grossly under emphasized.  It is
difficult to see how they could have over looked this fact.  Unless, the
figures look better on paper than they do in actual reality.  According to
our sources, we had the lowest groundnut output in eons during the last
growing season. Plus the fact that the farmers sold across the border as
opposed to the government because at least they would receive hard earned
cash this way.  These factors equal an even lower output.  I predict that the
economic situation get worse once the sales from the export of this output
are tallied during the next fiscal year.  No amount of tinkering and
tampering with our reserves will help them this time.  But it might be too
late by then, and we will really need the aid then.

In a nutshell, though I cannot do much justice to this report, we, as a
country and people, are in a whole heap of trouble.  Lately, I have been
unable to write due to an ever increasing workload but there have been calls
on the L for civil disobedience and violence as an alternative. I disagree
with these alternatives.  Civil disobedience will be met by a hail of bullets
like before, while violence will only further harm our own people.

The people of The Gambia need tangible, hard and cold facts.  Facts that when
put on the table will be alarming enough to make the people react and
similarly force a reaction in the leadership that will back them more into a
smaller corner than they are already in.  We have the minds and the
intellects to do this.

If we follow this policy, the demon in power will very soon shift his tone of
six feet under to "Ma Tei Ma Ko Sacha."  Knowing this man's mental capacity,
when backed into a tight corner his attitude will shift to one of an
omnipotent power who is invincible.  Once he does this, The Gambian people
will decide what action to take.  I guarantee you that it will not be pretty.

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