As the economic crisis rages on many promises have been made to African countries to help them out of the crisis. The G20 through the IMF and the World Bank and individual countries have all pitched into the rescue operation. The reality however, is that apart from the fear that the rescue package of $100 billion may delay or not be fully met given earlier experience, the framework within which the monies are to be disbursed are no different from well-known failed policies.

     Already only half of the additional resources for the IMF were available immediately from some member States. According to UNCTAD’s Trade and Development Report 2009, ‘only part of the new SDR allocation will directly benefit those countries that are most in need of international liquidity: since the additional SDRs will be allocated to IMF members according to their quotas, only $80 billion will go to low- and middle income developing countries.’

     This clearly shows that those countries, especially African countries who really need multilateral financial support in the current crisis will not only get enough but even what may eventually get will trickle in thus defeating the purpose. This compounded with the non- review of the principles that have guided the policy conditions attached to lending would in the end as happened in the past lead the borrowing countries into even deeper crisis.

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