‘Austerity steps insuffi cient’
the managing director of the international monetary fund (imf) christine (lagarde) and others before her have urged us and the arab countries to cut down public sector salaries and government subsidies, control spending, achieve sustainable growth and create new jobs. this came in light of the huge defi - cits faced by some of the countries which have ended up borrowing to address the balance of payments or defi cit in the budget, whatever you may call it. here we talk especially of the gulf countries which continue with their unjustifi ed government spending which has exceeded 55 percent of their gross domestic product (gdp), according to the imf. lagarde said the austerity measures adopted by these countries are not good enough. they are largely temporary and do not mean much as long as there is no effect on the costly government subsidy and public sector salaries. she has said there is no justifi cation for these countries to continue subsidizing energy because of the high cost in spite of the reduction in subsidy in recent years. on the other hand, abdulrahman al hamidy, director-general and board chairman of the arab monetary fund said the value of arab energy subsidies fell from $117 billion in 2015 to $98 billion in 2017, according to the imf study. this amount, even after its reduction, remains a frightening waste. lagarde revealed a frightening fact about the unemployment among arab youth, the highest in the world, where the rates are 25 percent in the majority of arab countries, and more than 30 percent in nine arab countries, especially that half of the population in these countries comprising 400 million people are under the age of 25. how can jobs be provided for all those in the next few years? what lagarde has revealed has reached the danger level and is painful. the unprecedented state of corruption in which we live is most serious and most painful too. an engineer and owner of a large contracting company told me, during the past 40 years he had not seen all this audacity or rudeness asking for bribe in public, as if it were a necessity for work and the one who asks for it has the right. therefore, the government is called upon to stop this moral collapse in the values and virtues of society, which are being eroded by a handful of corrupt and ineffectual perpetrators who do not have any work but grab whatever they can stretch their hands upon even if they know the state is on the verge of collapse. during an interview with the former minister of justice, minister of awqaf and islamic affairs, yaqoub al-sanea on the tv channel atv, he spoke about corruption in the ministry and how one of the offi cials had asked him to approve an offi cial mission to a european country to learn about its experience in agriculture although he is responsible for the mosques sector. he said the request was rejected because the agriculture companies in kuwait are concerned with agriculture and not that offi cial. he also rejected requests of other ministry offi cials to sanction a visit to a well-known sports club in europe to promote religion among the players of that team.
