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A visit this week by International Monetary Fund managing
director Rodrigo de Rato to Indonesia is nothing more than a normal
courtesy call, Indonesia's top economics minister says.
"There is nothing in particular penciled in of a substantive nature.
We're just regular IMF members now, while he happens to paying a visit
to the region," Coordinating Minister for the Economy Boediono told
reporters Friday.
"It so happens that Indonesia will be among the countries he will
visit, so we will welcome him."
However, Boediono said the government would use the opportunity to
discuss with the IMF the latest economic conditions in Indonesia after
the country repaid its remaining obligations to the IMF last year.
"We will listen to Mr. de Rato's views, and will also tell him about
what he have done and achieved so far," he said. "If he has any good
recommendations, we will consider them."
Mr. de Rato will pay visits to Japan, Indonesia and China between Jan.
21 and 26, which visits will include meetings with senior officials
from each of the countries.
He is in Japan on Jan. 21 and 22 to give an address and participate in
an international symposium organized by the Bank of Japan's Center for
Monetary Cooperation in Asia (CeMCoA), which is focusing on the
challenges facing Asian economies and financial markets. He is also set
to meet with the new Japanese government's economics team.
Mr. de Rato will then visit Indonesia on Jan. 23 and 24 to meet with
officials, business leaders, representatives of the private sector and
academics.
His three-nation visit will conclude on Jan. 25 and 26 in China, where
he will also hold a series of meetings with officials.
Indonesia last year repaid US$7.8 billion of its remaining debt to the
IMF, closing the book on years of a politically-sensitive relationship
with the Washington-based financial agency.
Between 1997 and 2003, the IMF provided some $25 billion in loans to
help Indonesia rescue its banking system, rehabilitate the economy by
restructuring private and government debt, and strengthen its foreign
exchange reserves.
Criticism arose, however, as the loan program called for the government
to implement a number of tough economic reform programs under IMF
supervision, including privatizing state firms and reducing subsidies,
which many nationalists saw as damaging the nation's interests without
significantly improving the economy. Foreign debt costs have always
been criticized here as well for draining off funds that could have
been used for welfare development.
The government, under public pressure, eventually terminated its
program with the IMF at the end of 2003, but still remained under the
Fund's "post-program monitoring" to assess the government's own reform
targets.
Last year's final debt repayment ended this monitoring.
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