There are a number of reasons for this: Firstly, it must be remembered that South Africa had its own mini-crisis in 1996 when sudden capital outflows from the country forced a depreciation of the rand of more than 20 per cent, and the introduction of restrictive fiscal and monetary policies that reduced the growth rate in total domestic expenditure from 5.0 per cent in 1995 to 2.7 per cent in 1996, and 1.4 per cent in 1997.
At the time of the East Asian crisis, South Africa had just gone through a very painful downward economic adjustment BIS Review 38/1998  -3-  period that satisfied foreign investors of our resolve to apply acceptable macroeconomic disciplines.