MAQzine

IMF seeks illiterate Pak September 24, 2010 THE countrywide protests by public sector universities reflect the extent to which the government and its IMF-thrust economic managers are prepared to destroy the quality of life for most Pakistanis by depriving them of higher education. For the members of the Federation of All Pakistan University Academic Staff Associations (FAPUASA) calling for a strike is no easy move and such calls may backfire. However, the unanimity of the present protest shows how threatened these public sector universities feel.   Nor are they wrong. A statement issued by the IMF-approved Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Dr Haq declared rather imperiously that the country was facing a budgetary crunch and therefore development allocations had to be cut. Now if he was actually concerned about the future of Pakistan and not desperate to make it a country where only the rich under an exploitative capitalist system survive and thrive, he would have advo...

Sarju Kaul London Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, attending his first G-20 meeting, on Friday afternoon announced that India would contribute $10 billion from its reserves in the Bric combined contribution of $80 billion to supplement the resources of the International Monetary Fund. China has already contributed $50 billion and the remaining sum will be divided between Russia and Brazil. Despite American insistence that the Bric governments provide new resources to the IMF through its New Arrang-ement to Borrow (NAB), the Bric nations made it clear that demand for added resources should not be used to put off quota reforms in the international financial institutions. "The Bric nations are not too happy with NAB," Brazilian foreign minister Guido Mantega said and added that the Western nations "should change rules to reflect the new economic scenario in the world". The Bric nations also agreed to a joint stand on the issue of IMF and World Bank quota ref...