Blog the Debt

Pittsbugh Post-Gazette: Message of Faith Will Be Delivered to Delegates

G20 Delegates look out!  According to Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Ann Rodgers, the G20 will be getting some advice from diverse faith communities and civil society.  Read the full article here.  
 
Excerpt From: Message of faith will be delivered to delegates
By Ann Rodgers, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Gene Tibbs, a staff member of the evangelical Coalition for Christian Outreach at the University of Pittsburgh, wants to show people what to pray for and show that advocacy works. He is coordinator of Drop the Debt, Pitt's affiliate of Jubilee USA, a faith-based effort to cancel the debt of the poorest nations.
 
The word "jubilee" comes from the Bible, where Leviticus 25 designates every 50th year as a time to forgive debts and free slaves.
 
"The overarching message for us as Christians, who strongly believe in the moral component of justice, is to hold the G-20 to account for the promises they made in London," Mr. Tibbs said.
 
For instance, the G-20 urged the International Monetary Fund to sell gold reserves to benefit nations where people were starving. His group will hand out report cards showing how such promises have been kept.
 
Jubilee USA is sponsoring a speaker from Zambia, Privilage Haangandu, debt program manager with Jubilee Zambia and the Jesuit Center for Theological Reflection. Mr. Haangandu will explain how money that might be spent on roads and schools and the development of small businesses and farms goes to pay off ill-gotten debt.

But he will also explain how past promises by the G-20 caused the IMF and World Bank to grant relief that allowed Zambia to drop some fees for public schools.

"That has allowed an additional million children to go to school every day. That is one of the more exciting developments of the last few years in Zambia alone and it's a direct result of the debt campaign," Mr. Tibbs said.

Mr. Haangandu will speak Sept. 21 at the People's Summit, a self-described "informed dialogue" about social justice and the G-20. Details are at www.peoplessummit.com.

 

 

Jubilee Oregon Wins Big

Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon, a statewide association of Christian denominations congregations, ecumenical organizations and interfaith partners, just awarded Jubilee Oregon with the Vollum Ecumenical Humanitarian Award!

Most people who know the Jubilee USA Network know Jubilee Oregon. We all admire how much our friends in the Pacific Northwest contribute to Jubilee justice. Thanks to their work, Oregon is the only state in which all Senators and Representatives co-sponsored the Jubilee Act! This year (among many other things) the coalition worked with their 18 Jubilee Congregations, 11-person board and countless members to host a visit from Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Read about that here.

This award is presented in recognition of how an outstanding commitment to humanitarian responsibility has significantly enhanced ecumenical efforts in the state and quality of life for all.

Jubilee Oregon will be honored at the biggest Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon event of the year - the Annual Dinner and Community Celebration - on October 13, 2009 with with over 1400 faith communities invited. If you're in the area, you should stop by. Enjoy the party - you deserve it!

Check out Jubilee Oregon's website

Vulture fund swoops on Congo over $100m debt

(Another vicious vulture fund uncovered! Read this article published yesterday in the UK's The Observer)

Vulture fund swoops on Congo over $100m debt
Anger as war-torn DRC racks up massive fines
By Heather Stewart and Ashley Seager

The government of the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo is racking up fines of $20,000 a week in a case brought by a New York-based vulture fund over a debt incurred from Tito's Yugoslavia in the 1980s.

Vulture funds are so called because they prey on the world's poorest countries, buying up their sovereign debt cheaply on capital markets and then going to courts, often in Britain or the United States, to enforce payment of the full value of the debt.

A Washington Court handed down a penalty against the DRC in March, starting at $5,000 a week and eventually rising to $80,000, for failing to comply with a demand to provide detailed information about all its assets throughout the world.

The fine is the latest twist in the long-running effort by investment fund FG Hemisphere to collect a debt first incurred 20 years ago, when the notorious dictator Mobutu Sese Seko was in power in the DRC. The debt now amounts to $100m, including interest and penalties.

Lawyers for the African country have lodged an objection to the penalty, on the grounds that the district court has no jurisdiction over a sovereign state; but Stephen Cundra, of law firm Roetzel and Andress, who is representing the DRC, said no ruling has so far been handed down on whether the fine must stand.

"Eight million people have died in the Congo for lack of healthcare... and the last thing they can do is find $100m for a vulture fund," Cundra said.

As well as a series of moves to take control of the DRC's assets in Washington, the fund has also taken action in Hong Kong and South Africa.

FG Hemisphere, which was unavailable for comment, describes itself as "a New York-based investment company specialising in uncovering, investigating and managing alternative investment opportunities and special situations within the emerging markets."

Nick Dearden, director of the Jubilee Debt Campaign, said: "The World Bank has made clear that DRC cannot afford to repay its debts. Today as DRC struggles to emerge from a past characterised by slavery, imperialism, looting and war, they are attacked again by financial vultures."

Tamara Gaw, in-house counsel at campaign group TransAfrica Forum, said the case underlined the urgent need for legislation to prevent vulture funds pursuing developing countries' debts on American soil.

The Stop Vultures Act is on its way through the House of Representatives. Britain announced last month that it would also consult on bringing in a law to cap the amounts an institution could claim against a poor country.

But the government was spurred into more concrete measures by a group of 12 cross-party MPs who had called in parliament for a Developing Country Debt (Restriction of Recovery) bill that would seek to ban hedge funds and other creditors from taking legal action against the world's poorest countries.

At least 54 companies are known to have taken legal action against 12 of the world's poorest countries in recent years, for claims amounting to over $1.8bn (£1.2bn).

Debt Cancellation's Strange Bedfellows

Jubilee as matchmaker?  In this week's Congressional Quarterly, Ben Weyl writes about strange bedfellows and their alliances around international issues. Click here to read the whole article.

He writes, "Perhaps the most prominent cross-aisle alliance on human rights has coalesced around proposed debt relief in the developing world. While that cause is widely identified with U2 frontman Bono, it has also won adherents on the religious right — notably Republican Rep. Spencer Bachus of Alabama. Bachus has teamed with a network of religious advocacy groups, development agencies and human rights organizations called the Jubilee USA Network to promote debt relief."

“'It’s always interesting to see the way in which a person’s faith moves people from the whole ideological spectrum to take what might appear to be surprising stands, what are often politically difficult stands,' says Neil Watkins, executive director of Jubilee USA. 'For Spencer Bachus to take a leadership position is probably not always something he gets a ton of credit for in his district, but he does it because of his commitment and his faith.'"

"In one of the more striking strange-bedfellows alliances, the socially conservative Bachus teamed with liberal Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters of California in the last Congress to move legislation that could secure close to $40 billion in debt relief for the developing world. Even though the bill eventually stalled, it was still a significant sign, observers say, of an emerging cross-ideological consensus on global human rights questions in Washington. 'I don’t think there are many members of Congress that on many issues are further apart, but on this one, they come together and they’re friends,' Watkins said."

Click to read the article "American Right, Left Find Common Ground Abroad."

The vultures that prey on the poorest

By Hayley Hathaway

“Britain is, at last, clipping the wings of the hedge funds that pick the bones of the world’s weakest countries,” wrote Simon Evans of The Independent on July 26th. Last week, the British Government offered a proposal that would end the harmful practice of vulture funds – predatory lenders who buy up poor countries' debts on the cheap, go to court in the US, Britain, or France and sue for the original amount plus interest. Continues Evans: “It is an industry with few friends in the developing world but plenty in the corridors of Wall Street and the City.”

The British legislation looks similar to the legislation put forth by Maxine Waters (D-CA) and Spencer Bauchus (R-AL) here in the US. The two pieces of legislation would effectively cap the profit vulture funds could make, leaving little reason for them to continue the lengthy, expensive process of suing a poor country – and winning – in a foreign court.

The Stop Vultures Act has been an ongoing campaign led in the US by Jubilee USA Network, Africa Action, TransAfrica Forum and others. Says Tammi Gaw of TransAfrica Forum, '"If both the moves in America and Great Britain become law, then the courts will in effect be shut to vulture profiteering.”' The work will not be over, though; she continues: “'But I tend to think of these vultures as being like Medusa, so I fully expect them to try to pursue alternative avenues to continue their business. But it will be difficult.'"

Click here to read the full article "The vultures that prey on the poorest" to learn more about vulture funds, how they’ve impacted impoverished countries, and the legislation to try to stop them.