South Africa does not need an IMF bailout - Dawie Roodt

Author and political scientist RW Johnson has predicted that South Africa will eventually be forced to go to the IMF and ask for a loan. Several other analysts have also supported this idea, but this lender of last resort has been described as a brutal loan shark by countries who were forced to go to an IMF bailout. Asking for a loan comes with strings attached; countries have to apply painful structural adjustment programmes. So, is this what South Africa would be forced to do if it does not get the spiralling debt of Eskom and the other state owned enterprises under control? Chief Economist of the Efficient Group, Dawie Roodt told Biznews in an interview that South Africa did not need an IMF loan, but it could be an option if a desperate Finance Minister wanted to enforce much-needed structural change in South Africa. - Linda van Tilburg