The Jubilee Blog

Getting Debt Into G-8 Summit Conversations

Jubilee USA National Coordinator Neil Watkins wrote "Will Vultures Be Allowed to Undermine the G-8 Summit?", an article for commondreams.org  that challenges the influence of vulture fund managers on the G-8 proceedings happening next week in Heiligendamm, Germany. In the article, Neil discusses the 2005 G-8 leaders made in Gleneagles, Scotland, while explaining how they have not kept their promises to civil society and impoverished nations who need their debts canceled to meet the Millennium Development Goals in 2015.

The G-8 Summit is an opportunity for the leaders from the world's richest nations to actually tackle problems that are causing and sustaining poverty countries in Africa, South/Central America and Asia. One of these challenges are vulture funds, which are companies that purchase the debts of impoverished countries on the cheap, then sue them in U.S. and European courts for the initial cost of the debt. More often than not, the companies win their lawsuits, thus depriving impoverished countries of much-needed funds that could be directed toward furthering educational and health care initiatives. Neil writes:

In January, I saw first-hand the impact that decisions from a G-8 summit meeting can have on people’s lives. I visited a rural health clinic in Siavonga, Zambia which had recently abolished “user fees” for access to health care. For residents, it was a life-saving decision: now, many more patients had access to HIV/AIDS drugs that could literally save their lives.

Zambia is not, unfortunately, an isolated case. There are 14 African nations which have been sued by vulture funds, commercial creditors, and others creditors not party to the G-8 debt deal since 1999. Right now, vultures are threatening Zambia, Republic of Congo, and Liberia.

The vultures are undermining the promise the G-8 made two years ago in Gleneagles. To preserve their own initiative and credibility, leaders must take action now. In recent weeks, the Bush administration, UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and German officials have all expressed concern about vulture activity. Even the Paris Club joined in last week and “agreed to intensify their work on this issue with a view to identify concrete measures to tackle this problem.”

READ FULL ARTICLE

Meanwhile, Danny Glover (actor and activist) and Nicole Lee of TransAfrica Forum also wrote an exellent piece on the impact vulture funds.

And last week, Congressman Donald Payne (D-NJ) called for stronger action in the US against vulture funds.

Illegitimate Debt Bulletin V.2

The Illegitimate Debt Bulletin is a new publication that will come out every two months to summarize recent and forthcoming actions in the illegitimate debt campaign, carried out by activists across the world. It aims to publicise the actions and give opportunities for more people to get involved to challenge illegitimate debts and the structures which lead to them.

The bulletin is produced by CADTM, Eurodad, Jubilee South and Jubilee USA.

Please send your feedback and ideas on this bulletin to [email protected].  Feel free to use the articles in your lists and newsletters. Please, cite the source and include the links to the organisation concerned.

The next issue will come out in July. The deadline to submit articles will be 10 July. Submit articles in a short format (200 words), with web links and/or e-mail addresses as appropriate. Please send to [email protected] or [email protected].

• Download English Version
• Download French Version
• Download Spanish Version

Robert Zoellick is New World Bank President

Today, President Bush announced Robert Zoellick as his pick to replace outgoing World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz at the end of June.

Here's The New York Times bio on Zoellick:
Robert B. Zoellick, who stepped down as deputy secretary of state last summer, is now a Goldman Sachs managing director. As deputy secretary, Mr. Zoellick was the primary architect of the administration's policy toward Sudan. He also served as U.S. trade representative from February 2001 to February 2005. On May 29, administration officials said that President Bush chose Mr. Zoellick to lead the World Bank and try to heal the bitter rifts left by the ouster of Paul D. Wolfowitz. 

• Full Article in The NY Times
• Wall Street Journal's Blog

Jubilee on the ONE Blog + Upcoming Conference + Friday Nite

Things have been busy in the Jubilee Headquarters, so we haven't been posting regularly. But excuses aside (update coming next week as Neil Watkins, Jubilee's national coordinator, attends the G-8 Summit in Germany) we have been working tirelessly on the upcoming Grassroots Training & Organizing Conference, which will be held in Chicago, June 15 to 17. The Friday night event, featuring Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman and Tanzanian political cartoonist Gado Mwampembwa.

Jeremy John, Jubilee USA's Chicago Grassroots Conference Organizer, wrote a post for the ONE Campaign's blog about the conference and it's role in educating and training grassroots folk (people like you and me!) in what it will take to eliminate global poverty. Check out the blog.

Take the Survey: What Happens After Wolfowitz Leaves?

The resignation of Paul Wolfowitz has sparked a global debate about the choice of the next World Bank president. To help inform this debate, the Center for Global Development has launched an online survey gathering views on the selection process, the desired qualifications, and perceptions of the qualifications of some of the possible candidates mentioned in press reports.

Learn more and take the survey

Politics for Breakfast, Faith for Thought

|By Jean O'Leary, Jubilee San Diego|

On Saturday, May 12, a group from Jubilee San Diego attended a breakfast at St. Paul's Episcopal Cathedral in San Diego to hear Bob Edgar, General Secretary of the National Council of Churches speak on "Religion, Politics, and the 2008 Presidential Election."   

Bob Edgar is also a former six-term congressman from Pennsylvania and a supporter of Jubilee USA Network. 

This event was sponsored by the San Diego Foundation for Change, a diverse group of progressive-minded people dedicated to cultivating a "bi-national garden" of grassroots organizations working for social, economic and environmental justice in San Diego, California, and Tijuana, Mexico.

Most of Bob Edgar's talk focused on the central theme of his latest book, Middle Church: Reclaiming the Moral Values of the Faithful Majority from the Religious Right.

On this day, we also celebrated Sister Kay Heidkamp's 80th birthday. Kay, one of our earliest supporters of Jubilee in San Diego, was recognized by Bob Edgar during his talk. Sister Kay, along with Bill Harman, will be attending the Jubilee Grassroots Conference in Chicago next month.

Head(s) Begin to Roll at the World Bank...

World Bank Panel Finds Wolfowitz at Fault; Aide Resigns
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN | New York Times

WASHINGTON, May 7 — A committee of World Bank directors has formally notified Paul D. Wolfowitz that they found him to be guilty of a conflict of interest in arranging for a pay raise and promotion for Shaha Ali Riza, his companion, in 2005. The findings stepped up the pressure on Mr. Wolfowitz to resign.

The contents of the panel’s findings were not made public. People who are familiar with the panel’s report said that it reviewed extensive documents and testimony before concluding that Mr. Wolfowitz breached his obligations in arranging for Ms. Riza’s reassignment from the bank to the State Department.

The report, as transmitted to Mr. Wolfowitz, did not recommend a punishment for Mr. Wolfowitz. Bank officials, speaking anonymously because the proceedings are supposed to be confidential, said that the special committee was still working today on what to recommend.

It was not clear whether the committee, consisting of seven of the bank’s 24 board members, would remove Mr. Wolfowitz from his post or, more likely, express a loss of confidence in his leadership in a manner that might persuade him to resign. Bank officials say that a majority of the bank board has concluded that he should go.

In another sign of Mr. Wolfowitz’s difficulties, his top communications aide, Kevin Kellems, resigned today, saying that “the current environment surrounding the leadership” at the bank made it “very difficult to be effective in helping to advance the mission of the institution.”

Mr. Kellems said in a written statement that he had “tremendous respect and admiration” for the bank’s staff. He made no mention of Mr. Wolfowitz, with whom he had a close association when the bank president was deputy secretary of defense. READ FULL STORY HERE

• Kellems in happier times
• Kellems speaking at the Bank's 5th Communications Forum

Kyoto People's Forum Ends Successfully

|By Yoko Akimoto|
Secretariat, ATTAC Japan

There were some 300 participants at the plenary session, 400 at workshops and seminars, 140 at demonstration, which blessedly wiped out our initial uncertainty about low attendance. Persons at different age, from different groups such as NGOs, civic groups, social movements, trade unions, students' groups, residents' groups, or with different interest converged on the People's Forum held locally in a small and ancient town Kyoto. I can speak with assurance that this is "diversity", and I can also say that all of participants in the Forum found and recognized that ADB had a 40 years' history of destruction, abuse, hypocrisy and indebtedness, as our statement said.

There might have been some or maybe more than half of Japanese participants surprised at the fact - 40 years of hypocrisy- on ADB presented by foreign delegates. However, I heard in the lobby at the university youngsters talking about the previous day's demonstration "Hey! Can you imagine? I joined the demonstration for the first time. We demonstrators marched along a Shijo street, saying Down Down ADB or Get off ADB".

Certainly, the Kyoto People's Forum has created something significant in the dormant society which may have a spillover effect on other social movements. Organizers never enforced participants to understand how haphazard ADB projects were. They just presented what was presented by participants as it was. However, participants seem to have grasped a sense of justice through exchange of opinions or discussion.

At the workshop of Debt cancellation, a student insisted that all debts were not illegitimate and some were justified, and asked JubileeSouth for comment about his opinion. Lidy of JS politely objected to it, adding that JS therefore asked for audit of all debts.

In addition, alternative fund was discussed in the workshop. ATTAC Japan presented a platform on World Public Finance designed to restore democracy, redistribute wealth, democratize financial market, create a fair flow of money and change neoliberal global financial system for social justice and global solidarity.

The Forum was sort of a place for learning, particularly to Japanese participants. They understood the reality on ADB projects promoted by the Japanese government using money of tax payers.

What is required of them now is to create an action immediately to stop ADB projects for solidarity with people in other Asian countries.

For more information on civil society actions, mobilizations, and workshops during the Asian Development Bank's 40th Annual Governors Meetings, visit Focus on the Global South.

Jubilee San Diego Attends Interfaith Conference

By Jean O'Leary, Jubilee San Diego

On Saturday, April 28, members of Jubilee San Diego attended the Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions conference on "The Challenge of Respect: Celebrating Interfaith Commonality, Exploring Religious Differences."

This day-long event was hosted by The Omar Ibn Al Khattab Foundation located near the University of Southern California campus.

Our own Bill Harman served on the planning committee of this Interfaith group, thus this opportunity was presented to Jubilee to share a day with the greater Interfaith community in Los Angeles and Southern California.

It was a day of community building, talks, workshops, fellowship, prayer, expressions of art, and interfaith celebration.

Many prominent leaders in the Southern California Interfaith circles were present to lead discussions and share their experiences with a gathering of 150 participants. 

Jubilee San Diego had the opportunity to table throughout the entire day, with Betsy Barnhart, Sue Seebach, and Gail WInterbourne sharing tabling duties .

We also had Nancy and Jose, our college students from Los Angeles and members of our Jubilee San Diego coalition join us for dinner at the mosque.

New Report Exposes How the World Bank Investment Court Undermines Democracy

Released by Institute for Policy Studies and Food & Water Watch, the report explains how ICSID and other international arbitration tribunals enforce investment rules incorporated into trade and investment agreements, including U.S. trade pacts with 14 countries.

Although the United States and other rich countries have faced a number of these “investor-state” lawsuits, 93 percent have targeted low- or middle-income developing countries.

The report highlights 10 of the most controversial investor-state cases, including two of the more than 30 cases against Argentina, one against South Africa's affirmative action policies, as well as suits involving indigenous peoples’ rights in Ecuador, Bolivia, Canada, and the United States.

According to the report, ICSID tribunals have ruled in favor of the investor and ordered the government to pay compensation in nearly 70 percent of cases. Just the threat of an investor lawsuit can have a chilling effect on social or environmental initiatives, as policymakers justifiably worry about provoking an expensive lawsuit.

The announcement to withdraw from ICSID will not be enough to release the three Latin American countries from the inter-locking web of rules and institutions that now serve the interests of large corporations.

Bilateral investment treaties signed by Bolivia and Venezuela would still be in force, while Nicaragua would still be bound by the investment rules of the Central American Free Trade Agreement. Instead of taking claims related to alleged violations of these agreements to ICSID, foreign investors could appeal to UN or other arbitration tribunals.

Nevertheless, according to IPS Global Economy Project Director Sarah Anderson, “This announcement was tremendously significant on a political level. It may empower other countries to challenge these excessive investor protections and, most importantly, put forth proposals for more just trade and investment regimes.” The report concludes with a summary of proposals for change.

The report can be downloaded at: http://www.ips-dc.org/reports/070430-challengingcorporateinvestorrule.pdf