Pakistan’s opposition parties have promised to resist the country’s upcoming $6 billion loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund, terming the deal a sellout on the part of Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government.

An initial agreement, announced late on Sunday, has Pakistanis angry for two main reasons: It calls on them to start paying their income taxes and sets the stage for their money to lose more of its value.

On Monday, Ahsan Iqbal, a senior leader of the opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, told the Nikkei Asian Review that the agreement “is a complete capitulation [and in disregard to] Pakistan’s national interests. Never before in our history have we seen a government accept such tough conditions tied to an IMF program.”

Iqbal’s sentiment is widely shared among opposition leaders. After Reza Baqir, a former IMF official and a well-respected economist, early this month was appointed governor of Pakistan’s central bank, opposition leaders rejected the nomination. Iqbal said Baqir’s appointment only confirms that Pakistan has become “a colony of the IMF.”

He added, “You now have an IMF man running our central bank.”

The agreement, which still needs to be formally approved by the IMF’s senior management and the global lenders’ executive board, broadly aims to lift Pakistan’s meager tax collections and alleviate the country’s recurring balance of payments difficulties. Not even 1% of Pakistanis regularly pay income tax, making the country one of the world’s worst performers in this area.

Senior government officials in Islamabad said that subject to Pakistan fulfilling its promises to, among other things, increase electricity and gas taxes, the IMF’s senior management and the executive board should not block the agreement. “There is no reason why the IMF’s management and board in Washington will reject or alter the framework that Pakistan has agreed with IMF officials,” said one official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Khusro Bakhtiar, Pakistan’s federal minister of planning defends the IMF agreement. He also told privately run GEO TV that reforming Pakistan’s tax collection system is essential if the country is to secure its economic future. “Pakistan’s tax to GDP ratio, at 11.2%, is the lowest in the South Asian region,” he said. “We have to improve our tax collection.”

Pakistan, which is in line for its 13th loan from the IMF, is struggling against numerous challenges. On its website, the IMF points out Pakistan’s “lackluster growth, elevated inflation, high indebtedness and [its] weak external position.”

The assessment encapsulates Pakistan’s economic weaknesses over the past nine months, since Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), or Pakistan Justice Movement, formed the current government.

For several months after taking office, Khan’s government refused to formally approach the IMF, largely because ruling camp politicians believed Pakistan’s balance of payments difficulties could be overcome by borrowing from friendly countries.

But despite Saudi Arabia, the UAE and China lending more than $9 billion to help Pakistan stabilize its foreign currency reserves, investor confidence remains weak.

In its announcement, the IMF also indicated that “a market-determined exchange rate [for the Pakistani rupee] will help the functioning of the financial sector.” Critics such as Ahsan, the PML-N leader, said a market-determined exchange rate for the Pakistani currency appeared to suggest that Khan’s government has agreed to further devalue the rupee, which has fallen roughly 34% against the dollar since the end of 2017.

One senior Western diplomat in Pakistan told Nikkei that conditions tied to the IMF loan presented Khan’s government with a tough challenge.

“In Pakistan’s history, no previous government has accepted the kind of tough conditions that Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government has accepted on an IMF loan,” the diplomat said. “The government will of course become very unpopular if it does things like force more people to become taxpayers.”

But ministers from Khan’s cabinet said tough reforms are necessary to improve the rupee’s performance.

“If after two or three years, the economy stabilizes, tax collections improve and the rupee finally becomes stable after a series of devaluations, Pakistan’s economic health would improve,” said one minister who also asked for anonymity. “The prime minister is willing to take the risk, become unpopular now for the sake of a better future for Pakistan.”