wfn.org | World Bank President criticizes International Debt video

["Christopher Took" <storm@indigo.ie>]

ACNS LC051 - 26 July 1998

By Allan Reeder
Lambeth Conference Communications

Lambeth bishops got a quick lesson in the strong feelings on
either side of the international debt debate, Friday, when World
Bank President James Wolfensohn sharply criticized a video that
opened the conference plenary on debt.

The video, Chains of Debt, focused on the debt problems of
Tanzania and Jamaica. It was created by Christian Aid, associated
with Jubilee 2000, a coalition of agencies campaigning for debt
cancellation.

Mr. Wolfensohn said that the tape, used to introduce the debt
issue to the conference, "would have you believe that I rather
like children dying, that I have no faith, that my interest is to
collect debts, that I have no understanding of education or
health, that I know nothing about the impact of payments imposed
by governments. And all I can say to you is that I believe that
each of those assertions is wrong."

The video told stories from the developing world of a dying baby,
children denied an education, and a cholera epidemic in Tanzania
caused by the lack of clean drinking water. According to the
tape, the government could not afford to create a sanitary water
system because "30 percent of its annual revenue goes for debt
repayment."

A woman interviewed on the video, called on the World Bank to
visit the Jamaican slums to see the local impact of government
debt repayments. But Mr. Wolfensohn responded that he had already
been to the slums himself, visiting "the worst sections and
segments of Jamaica and of Kingston."

Mr. Wolfensohn related that "I met with gang leaders who were
armed, where I sat by the roadside . . . talking about how we
could alleviate poverty, and where we as a bank have put $200
million into Jamaica to try and make life more tolerable."

Mr. Wolfensohn claimed that the World Bank was at the front line
of tackling international social issues: "The highest item on our
agenda on which we're putting $3 billion this year is education
and health."

Programs initiated by the World Bank have "nearly eradicated
River Blindness in Africa for 30 million people," he said. "We're
the major fighter in the world against AIDS. We're the major
fighter in the world against malaria. None of that is in your
film. None of it.

"I am not angry about the film. I'm upset. I'm upset because it
paints a picture of our institution which is quite simply wrong,"
said Mr. Wolfensohn. "I work with 10,000 people in the bank who
are committed to poverty eradication. We do not get up every
morning and think what we can do to ruin the world."

Hurdles to cancellation

The World Bank president outlined the limits to the World Bank's
capacity to cancel debt. Even if the 180 countries participating
in the bank "want me to forgive debt," despite a "balance sheet
of 150 billion dollars, I can forgive 23 billion dollars," he
said. "Why? Because the only capital I have is 23 billion
dollars."

Since the amount that the bank can borrow to assist countries is
restricted by the bank's capital, he appealed to the bishops:
"Look at the realities of what you are suggesting."

If he uses his balance to cancel debt, he said, "I cannot do 75
billion dollars worth of business because I cannot borrow the
money because the money I can borrow depends on the capital I
have."

He also reminded the bishops that the World Bank is only one
player in the complex network of international development loans.
He said he constantly tries to convince governments to spend more
to alleviate poverty. "They are not giving the money for either
debt relief or for overseas development assistance at the rate
that it should be done," he said.

Finding common ground

Mr. Wolfensohn said the conference should emphasize cooperation,
not accusation.

"The reason that I have come to admire the Archbishop of
Canterbury to such an enormous extent is that he has shown to me
an openness to say, 'We're both fighting poverty. Let's see what
we can do together,'" Mr. Wolfensohn said.

"The more positive thing that I would suggest as I conclude is
that instead of fighting each other and leveling accusations, we
focus on the kids that are dying, and on the children who are not
being educated and on the horrors of poverty together," he said.

"Together we can do a lot. We have expertise. You have expertise.
We know a lot about development. You know a lot about people and
communities. You have the best distribution system of any NGO in
the world. You are out there in the field with your flocks, you
and other religions," he said.  "And we can both service the poor
better together and we can influence governments better together
and I believe we can make a real possibility that our children
will have a better chance of living in peace and prosperity if we
work together."

Bishops react to president's remarks

Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane of Cape Town (Southern Africa),
who spoke after Mr. Wolfensohn, said the bishops had not come to
Lambeth "to cast stones on anyone, but are here to reason
together and to find solutions at the dawn of this millennium."

Everyone is needed on this mission, including the World Bank and
the IMF, he said. But when policies are skewed in favor of the
creditors, it is reasonable to raise questions, he added.

Others said Mr. Wolfensohn had over-reacted.

"The response of the president of the World Bank to a rather tame
film shows a level of intolerance and insensitivity which
surprised even someone like me who did not expect much," said
Bishop Alfred Reid of Montego Bay (Jamaica).

Bishop Reid, a member of the subsection on international debt,
said, "It is not lost on me that the president of the World Bank
devoted only five to seven minutes of his 25-minute speech to the
actual subject of debt-the rest being nothing more than a
defensive diatribe against the Christian Aid film. He left before
the responsive speech by the Archbishop of Cape Town."

Kenya's Archbishop David Gitari said that the president of the
World Bank, "should not have reacted all that bitterly against
the film. After all the film was meant for educating people, not
for criticizing the World Bank."

Mexico's Bishop Sergio Carranza-Gomez said, "I understand part of
his reaction but I think he over-reacted. We cannot deny the fact
that the bank and the IMF are really squeezing life from many of
our countries."

Video producers stand by their story

Dr. Roger Williamson of Christian Aid told a news conference
after the plenary that his organization stood by the video, and
Worcester's Bishop Peter Selby (England), the conference's chair
of the subsection dealing with international debt, publicly
endorsed the video in the plenary's last address.

"Copies of the video are on the way for all the bishops," Bishop
Selby said. "It is a gift from Christians in this country. They
see it as a resource. I see is as an honoring of our conference
and an honoring of the subject."

In the tape, a young boy tells how he was forced to drop out of
school because his parents cannot afford to pay the fees
instituted by the Tanzanian government as part of their debt
repayment efforts.  According to the video, 17 countries in
Africa have fewer children enrolled in school now than they did
in 1980 because of the school fees.

The video took particular aim at the Heavily Indebted Poor
Countries (HIPC) Initiative of the World Bank and the IMF,
claiming that it was too small an effort. "Europe spends on ice
cream alone twice as much as HIPC," a United Nation Development
Programme official says.

Mr. Anthony Boote of the IMF, one of the people quoted in the
video, said at the press conference, however, that he felt the
video so simplified the issues that it left an inaccurate
picture.

"It didn't really characterize the problem [of abject poverty]
carefully," Mr. Boote said. "There was poverty before there was
international debt and there will be poverty" even if the debt is
canceled.

Nan Cobbey, Katie Sherrod, David Skidmore, Lisa Barrowclough and
James Thrall contributed to this story.

For further information, contact:

   Lambeth Conference Communications
   Canterbury Business School
   University of Kent at Canterbury
   Telephone: 01227 827348/9
   Fax: 01227 828085
   Mobile: 0374 800212

   http://www.lambethconference.org

All press releases are available from the Lambeth Conference web site at
www.lambethconference.org.

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