What are more than 2,500 of the World’s finest brains – top policy makers, academics and CEOs, doing in the Swiss ski-resort of Davos for five days? Soul-searching and deal making – that’s what they are doing. They are there to discuss a problem of biblical proportions. What began with the US sub-prime crisis morphed into something that the world has never seen since the Wall Street crash of 1929. The world’s finest brains - the likes of Joseph Stiglitz, George Soros and Rupert Murdoch, are still unable to fully fathom the depths of the recession the world is headed into.
The biggest economies in the world - US, Japan and Europe are in their first simultaneous recession since World War II. In spite of the trillions of dollars Governments around the world have pledged to pump into their economies to prevent more colossal failures like that of Lehman Bros and Bear Sterns, the problems seem more insurmountable with each passing day.
How about us Maldivians? Are we insulated from the Worlds problems? There is no reason for me, as an average Maldivian, to believe that the situation at home is any better, if not worse. With our gross reserves at less than 2 months of imports the rufiyaa is literally on the ventilator, silently praying for the USD 100 million life support pledged by the Indians to arrive before that final fatal beep.
While the world’s finest men and women are giving their best shot at helping the world’s economy recuperate to health, our best brains - our crème de la crème - seem to be embroiled in something this average Maldivian saw as a petty budget squabble between two agencies within the Maldives’ judiciary! God help this country!
10 comments:
funny. absolutely hilarious. why dont you email this post to kutti. Read his take on what you saw as a "petty budget problem"
http://www.mnasheed.com/2009/01/supporting-judicial-independence/#more-337
ayya
I just can't find the correct words to describe the gravity of our stupidity.
naimbey, what made u think that Hassan Saeed, Jameel, Kutti, Azima, Shaheen Hameed, Deena husaain and the rest are the finest brains in this country? let me tell u this. these people arent any smarter than u and me. they are also just garudhiya eating Maldivians. they jsut pretend that they are smarter than average maldivians. and some of us like u are so naive to think that they are smart and intelligent.
when we are having the biggest fiscal problem ever why are we not seeing central bank governor and Finance minister. I know they will be working hard behind the scenes. but i expect my finance minister and central bank governor to apprear on the media and share their thoughts on what is happening and what they are doing to save this country from bankruptcy. Ali Hashim and Fazeel Najeeb please come out of your dens to explain to us what is happening and waht u are doing to help us! ayya
Like 6:07 said hassan, azima et. al. are not the best minds of the country. nor is Soros, Stiglitz etc.
I don't believe that they are unable to fathom the proportions of the problem. Its very difficult to believe that these economists (and nobel prize winners at that) seem to have no idea of how this happened. Or does not publicly say the actual cause.
And I think the powers that be wants to keep it that way since they can use the scaremongering to pocket even more taxpayer's money. It was few days ago that the most recent nobel laureate Paul Krugman inisited that the current stimulus package might not be stimulating enough!! He himself agrees that this was a giant ponzi scheme, yet insist on pumping more money.
How is pumping more money into failed institutions going to solve the problem the world faces? A problem created by themselves?
I wish economics was more like science. Then almost everyone will be saying the same thing. Now it appears the answer to these problems depends on which economist you ask.
And that leaves the common folks like us confused.
Agree with Meekaku.
this is an artificially created, just for the purpose of a big money for few people behind the curtains.
I also believe up to some extent that this perpetual debt system that has been created decades ago is eventually collapsing. We will see a lot worse in the coming days. Funny that like anon:06:57 said our experts does not (at least) pretend to care about it.
Where is the finance minister, where is the Governer? I do not think with $116 mil in national reserve Anni can protect all savings of us if BOM collapse. We already know they have huge loans unpaid (bad debt- toxic debt-watever) and what do we do now! Becuase we simply do not have enough money to protect the bank (if goes to admin). Are we going to withdraw our saving in massive now? that would worsen the problem, but at the same time, we do not want to lose our life saving to be at obvious-risk. We are not convinced BOM is taking necessary measures, nor GOVT is doing enough. Even if it is, we do not know it.
We let the so called finest minds to create this mess and now we have to pay for it!
@ Meekaaku - what u say about Krugman, i think, very succinctly summarizes the dilemma of the situation. One the one hand if governments pump in the money they are giving implicit support to continue what you call the 'ponzi scheme' and on if they dont, the outcome will be far worse. total collapse of the entire financial system. Govt's are caught in a catch 22 situation.
anon@11:17
Thats the problem. The 'financial system' is the ponzi scheme as noted by PK.
Mathematically such a Ponzi scheme is going to collapse eventually. The bailout is just prolonging the eventual collapse.
I agree something needs to be done. Perhaps the bailout money could be used to help the ppl who are losing their homes instead of feeding to the scheme.
And government backing of the toxic assets is just social welfare for the rich.
You made a good point. Maldives should be very concerned about the global economic downturn.
Being small makes us even more vulnerable to such shocks.
But we have always taken the old Arab attitude to economy. Do nothing.
Government should show economic leadership but unfortunately for the present government, it has inherited too much of waste from the previous regime. Also because the last Government did not maintain high standards of Governance, it would be very easy for the present Government to do likewise.
There is too much garbage to be cleaned. Since Arif Hilmy left the Finance Ministry, the economy has wandered without much of a direction.
We need Arif Hilmy Back!
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