RI has secured $4.4b in foreign loans: Bambang
JAKARTA (JP): Finance Minister Bambang Subianto said on Tuesday Indonesia had secured US$4.4 billion out of the $6.32 billion in overseas loans needed to plug the 1999/2000 state budget deficit.
Bambang said the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank have committed $1 billion each, while Japan has pledged an equivalent of $2.4 billion through the so-called Miyazawa Plan.
"We will try to obtain the shortfall at the Consultative Group on Indonesia (CGI) meeting in June," he told the House of Representatives commission VIII on state budget and finance during a debate on the draft state budget.
The 1999/2000 budget is expected to be approved by the House on Feb.26.
Bambang expressed optimism that the CGI donor group would provide the remaining $1.9 billion shortfall despite major requests for aid from other crisis-hit nations.
"The creditors have so far indicated their commitment to helping Indonesia quickly come out of the current crisis," he said.
Bambang said that to win international support the government would consistently service its foreign debts according to the agreed schedules and would not seek another debt rescheduling facility.
"If we ask for another debt renegotiation, the results of last September's meeting will be invalid," he pointed out.
The government received the nod from the Paris Club government creditors in September to reschedule some $4.51 billion in principal payments on its debts due between August 6, 1998 and March 31, 2000, to a period of between 11 and 20 years.
Bambang said that it was the maximum debt rescheduling the country could have obtained.
Separately, the Coordinating Minister for Economy, Finance, and Industry Ginandjar Kartasasmita said on Monday in Washington that Indonesia was asking the International Monetary Fund for an additional $1 billion to add to the $11.3 billion the fund had already committed.
He told reporters after a meeting with IMF's managing director Michel Camdessus that the release of the extra funding was a condition for the disbursement of the $2.4 billion loan of the Miyazawa Plan which was pledged by the Japanese government earlier this month.
The $30 billion Miyazawa Plan is a bailout funding scheme promised by Japan last year to help the crisis-hit Southeast Asian nations.
Ginandjar said extra IMF funding and the earlier availability of World Bank loans would provide added support to Indonesia until the expected economic recovery in the second half of the fiscal year beginning April 1.
Ginandjar added that the Camdessus was "very positive" in his reaction to his request for extra funds from the IMF and that he will now take the proposition to the IMF board for approval.
The IMF has already augmented its original $10-billion contribution to the Indonesian rescue package by adding another $1 billion and so far the Indonesian government has drawn down $9 billion of the total.
Indonesia needs a total of $10.32 billion in overseas loans to help plug the 1999/2000 state budget deficit, comprising $6.32 in program loans and $4 billion in project loans.
Bambang said that $4 billion in project loans had already been secured as they are mostly part of the financing for ongoing government projects.
He said that the project loans had been pledged by the World Bank ($627.7 million), Germany ($302.36 million), Japan ($1.59 billion), and France ($82.5 million). (rei)