Jubilee Plus campaign on Indonesia produces results October 2001. Jubilee Plus' campaign to expose IMF blunders in Indonesia is producing results. Last week, a delegation from INFID, an International NGO Forum on Indonesian Development" with 100 participants inside and outside Indonesia, accompanied by a Jubilee Plus representative, called on Britain's Financial Secretary to the Treasury - the Rt. Hon. Paul Boateng MP in London. The delegation was led by Ms Binny Buchori and Mr. Sugeng Bahagijo of INFID - supporters of Jubilee Movement International. Klaus Schreiner from INFID representative in Europe was also among the delegates. Ms Buchori and Mr. Bahagijo drew Mr. Boateng's attention to the weaknesses and failures of IMF projects and to Indonesia's unsustainable debts. She noted that Britain's Export Credit Guarantee Department had verified that 44% of the debts owed to Britain were debts for military purchases by Suharto - for Hawk jets and Scorpion tanks amongst other equipment and training. Mr. Boateng responded by assuring Ms. Buchori that the British government had commissioned an independent IMF evaluation unit to investigate five of the IMF's projects in Indonesia. The unit, the independent Evaluation Office (EVO) will be headed up by Mr. Montek Ahluwalia, a member of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister of India. Mr. Ahluwalia took up his post in August, 2000, and will be responsible for establishing the rules and mechanisms by which the EVO will examine and evaluate IMF projects and loans. The EVO will report to the IMF's Finance and Monetary Committee, chaired by Gordon Brown, the UK's finance minister, who has asked Mr. Ahluwalia to investigate the projects in Indonesia. After the meeting, Ms Buchori said: "Indonesia has a huge foreign and domestic debt burden accrued by an undemocratic dictator, who was financed and armed by both western governments, the IMF and the World Bank. This burden now falls on the shoulders of the poor - the very people who had British Scorpion tanks and Hawk jets turned on them by Suharto and his generals. "While we welcome Mr. Boateng's announcement, the British government must take the initiative in the Paris Club and respond to the Indonesian government's appeal in April, 2001 for debt cancellation. We will be working with our partners in Paris Club countries to ensure that Indonesia gets a fair deal at the Paris Club in April, 2001 - and that military debts incurred by Suharto are written off by rich western creditors. "We appeal to campaigners in all the major OECD countries to join us in calling on their governments to write-off of all of Indonesia's odious, and in particular, military debts". Jubilee Plus Open letter to British Chancellor on Indonesia's debt    http://www.infid.or.id http://infid.ngonet.be