October 2004
This year marks what many activists have dubbed the unhappy birthday of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. It is 60 years since the creation of these institutions in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, and in that time period both have come to have a profound and controversial influence on the world.
These institutions claim to be acting in the interests of the global good, with mission statements such as the World Bank, which says that its "mission is to fight poverty and improve the living standards of people in the developing world". But critics slam both institutions for their lack of democracy and for creating a system of modern day colonialism that does nothing to advance the interests of the poor.
Over the last eight weeks in the lead up to the annual meetings of the WB and IMF in early October in Washington D.C., Pambazuka News has carried a series of articles looking at various aspects of the involvement of these institutions in Africa. Below is the contents list and website addresses of these articles.
Recalcitrant reformers require tougher tactics
Patrick Bond examines how the Bretton Woods Institutions have responded to criticism over their democratic credentials, their particular approach to development policy, their ongoing support for mega-projects and their failure to cancel debt. Boardroom tactics to reform the bank have not been successful, he shows, and it is in the grassroots movements to decommodify the goods and services which the World Bank and IMF increasingly put out of reach, that the only feasible alternative strategy can be found. See more
The rains do not fall on one person's roof…
Throughout the Global South, public goods or services such as water, electricity, education and health care have become the subject of privatization under a free market ethos pushed by international financial institutions. This ethos dictates that allowing private companies free rein is the only sure way to 'development'. The privatization of water is one of the hotly contested areas where activists who argue that water is a human right have squared up against water barons represented by powerful transnational companies.
In Ghana, the National Coalition Against the Privatization of Water has fought against a major water privatization project backed by the World Bank in a campaign that has wide resonance for movements against water privatization worldwide. In this question and answer article, Rudolf Amenga-Etego from the National Coalition Against the Privatization of Water, answers questions from Pambazuka News. See more
The Lesotho Highlands Water Project: Bribery on a massive scale
Fiona Darroch charts the dogged battle the tiny mountain kingdom of Lesotho has fought against multinational corporations in the World Bank-funded Lesotho Highlands Water project. The legal trials have set a precedent when it comes to corruption in mega development projects and focused attention on how the World Bank deals with corruption in the projects it funds. See more
Ignoring the EIR: How industry, government and the bank chose profits over people
Mining always seems to have had an exploitative nature, representing massive wealth for some and grinding poverty for others. The World Bank's Extractive Industries Review (EIR) was supposed to change all of this, but any hope that it would fizzled out in August with a few outraged NGO press releases. Bank management had met and failed to adopt recommendations that would have placed people over profit. ABDULAI DARIMANI from Third World Network Africa explains some of the political machinations that conspired against the adoption of the review's recommendations. See more
Global Apartheid continues to Haunt Global Democracy
Debt, argues Charles Mutasa from the African Forum and Network on Debt and Development (AFRODAD), is the new face of colonialism and slavery. It is an instrument used to plunder and exploit indebted countries' resources and ultimately is at the heart of the unequal power relations between the North and the South. The international community urgently needs to negotiate new measures to resolve Africa's debt crisis and end global apartheid. See more
The IMF and WB in Africa: A Disastrous Record
The International Monetary Fund and World Bank have "utterly failed" in reducing poverty and promoting development in Africa, says Demba Moussa Dembele of the Forum for African Alternatives. "In fact, they are instruments of domination and control in the hands of powerful states whose long-standing objective is to perpetuate the plunder of the resources of the Global South, especially Africa," he says, concluding that the fundamental role of the Bretton Woods Institutions in Africa is to promote and protect the interests of global capitalism. See more
A happy birthday?: The Chad/Cameroon oil pipeline one year on
While the Chad/Cameroon oil pipeline has been hailed as a model of how development projects can be instituted, oil corporations cannot be transformed into development agencies even with the best of intentions and monitoring mechanisms, writes Akong Charles from Global Village Cameroon. The flawed contention of the World Bank when it comes to development projects, he says, is that "one cannot eat omelettes without breaking some eggs''. But in the case of Africa the eggs are more often the poor who end up with no livelihood opportunities and become even poorer. See more
New report reveals: Zambian children paying the price for IMF policies
While the Zambian government will be expected to give up to $156 million to the IMF in debt payments this year, it does not have the resources to help solve the teacher crisis which has put thousands of Zambian teachers out of work, and even more students without an adequate education. The Global Campaign for Education report has made a number of recommendations to the IMF, all without any positive response. Co-author Lucia Fry from VSO said "Zambia shows us the need for a radical change in the way the IMF does its business. See more
