I still like to liken Indonesia as a big family with an awful lot of children. Our "parents" had no money so we borrowed-from the IMF, the World Bank, ADB, IDB, etc. Like any money lending agency or individual money lender, there are always conditionalities we have to meet before we are allowed to borrow. Very well, we have decided to consent to comply. Then in the course of the process, some of our own fellow Indonesians in charge of the borrowing used the money unwisely. Maybe they collaborated with foreign cronies, but this is beside the point. First we felt we were left with not much; then we were left with dependence on debts, and before we realize it debt servicing is already a trap.
Of course it is not fair (tell me what's fair in life?). The older generation did the borrowing, and enjoyed the defty embezzlements. In the long run, some of them died with impunity and inherited the wealth to their children and grandchildren. The rest of us, the young, have to foot the debt servicing through the nose.
And that's not the end of the sad story. Since early this century, our big family has not only borrowed from external sources; we have also borrowed domestically through bonds and other government securities. In fact, the total amount of domestic borrowing, in a mere matter of years, has outsized the foreign loans (which have accummulated after 3 decades or so), and in terms of interest rates and tenors, the terms are prohibitive.
Now, some of the arguments against the IMF as put forward in the media, sadly, tend to be easy to thwart. Weak arguments, good natured they may be, are dangerous and can backfire to the detriment of the struggle for equity and equatability. I can say with confidence that for one negative thought about an IMF-originated policy has at least a couple of justifications. Readily, the counter arguments outnumber such objection. If this were a battle of arguments, the victor would be obvious all of us. Take a deep look at the Letters of Intents prepared by our government and the IMF, chances are we will see how very good most of them are. The need for Indonesia to privatize SOEs, for instance, can't have been wrong in an environment where corrupt government officials were and are rampant; the need to stop subsidies would make a sound advise for a fiscally strapped government.
Actually, one of the "most dangerous" things from the IMF perhaps concerns its accounting system whereby government expenses in servicing principals and interests can be counted as "negative financing," with its consequence of hiding the true amount of deficit. As far as I know, not many people have treaded this path for questioning the intent of the financial agency. This can well be a strongest argument against the IMF, and thus worth pursuing.
I can go on forever on this, but what I'm trying to hint-tentatively at least, as I am still formulating my views on this--is that I suspect that rather than playing opposition from afar it may be far better for pressure groups, such as international or domestic NGOs to work closely with the government and even external financial agencies without sacrificing their critical mind.
While this issue needs to be satisfactorily addressed, the main problem for the big family is how to earn income. No government can rely solely on debts. It has to make money. It has to create jobs. These are real issues to concentrate on. Thus the title: IMF Aid--Helping the Poor? is, seen from a certain perspective, a naivety. Expecting other people, let alone business entitities, to really help this country is too good to be true. Expecting such institutions to really really really help the poor... is wishful thinking that gets us nowhere.
