Mmegi

The Latvian remedy: A bitter economic pill

Tough choices: Gaolathe has initiated cost containment in government and is spearheading the economic structural transformation agenda PIC: PHATSIMO KAPENG
Tough choices: Gaolathe has initiated cost containment in government and is spearheading the economic structural transformation agenda PIC: PHATSIMO KAPENG

The World Bank recommends that government slash the deficit by at least three percent of GDP as soon as possible to avoid a freefall into a debt crisis. For this year, that would require a P8.1 billion spending cut at a time when taxes and inflation are rising. MBONGENI MGUNI reports

The World Bank and its Bretton Woods fellow, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have a less than stellar history when it comes to giving governments in Africa advice about structural reforms in their economies.

In fact, many Africans, including those in the immediate regional neighbourhood, blame their persistent economic woes on structural adjustment programmes enforced by the IMF and supported by the World Bank in the 1980s and 1990s.

Editor's Comment
The State apparatus must be sanitised

When the State cannot rely on its own machinery to pursue suspected wrongdoing, repairing that machinery must become a national priority.The establishment of a Special Investigations and Asset Recovery Task Force may help government respond to the immediate challenge. However, Botswana cannot afford to leave the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime (DCEC) and the Directorate of Public Prosecutions (DPP) struggling whilst building...

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