IMF talks and strike.

THE first review of the ongoing IMF programme has kicked off in Islamabad at precisely the same time as the traders' strike, which by all indications has been widely observed around the country. The timing is very significant, since the government has promised to forward the traders' demand for the withdrawal of some key documentation measures to the IMF. The fact that the Fund will be asked to consider this request in the midst of an ongoing countrywide strike will perhaps add some urgency to the discussions. What is important, however, is that in the middle of this urgency, the costs and consequences of a retreat from the documentation goals of the government, announced in its last budget as well as clearly laid out in the Fund programme, will be very large. The traders are adamant that who they buy from and sell to is none of the government's concern, only the quantum of revenue that is recovered from them is its business. But in the last budget speech, it was clearly said that the 'primary theme of this budget is to improve documentation of economy', and conceding to the traders' demand to consider one tax on turnover as a full and final settlement of their tax obligations would be nothing short of a retreat from this...