ABSTRACT
In producing the Heavily Indebted Poor Country initiative Initiative, the World Bank (WB)/International Monetary Fund (IMF) admitted that they were finally conceding to the sustained pressure of nongovernmental organisations, having previously maintained for years that remission of multilateral debt was impossible. While pursuing the campaign for debt cancellation the author have come across many other disaffected former trainees and senior staff of the IFIs who got out because they disagreed fundamentally with the way the WB and IMF were carrying out their tasks. Another category of informant comprises technical experts who have been and in some cases are employed by the WB or IMF in project management. Lastly in the field of procurement, a vast area of activity dependent on WB and IMF projects, a method has grown up, and even copied by other major organisations outside the WB/IMF nexus; this, if viewed by an independent body, might well be found to be over-elaborate and very expensive.
