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Trillion Dollar Scandal
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Guest blog post from EG Justice’s Tutu Alicante:
Right now, a few of the world’s biggest oil, gas and mining companies are fighting hard to keep some very big secrets. They are lobbying against proposed laws supported by major European leaders that would lift the lid on trillions of dollars paid to governments across Africa – secret payments which can sometimes get into the wrong hands. This money should be going into vital services like schools, health clinics and roads that could help lift hundreds of millions out of poverty, not into the pockets of a few. Government ministers from across Europe meet in less than two weeks to discuss this legislation. It could save lives in Africa and help build a future where nobody needs to rely on aid. But some corporate lobbyists have swung into action and are trying to kill this effective legislation. Don’t let them win. Please stand with me and sign the petition telling European leaders not to give in to corporate lobbying The full petition reads: Dear European Leaders, Over the last decade, multinational companies have paid trillions of dollars to African governments in exchange for their natural resources. This is set to continue well into the future, providing a massive opportunity to lift hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. When African citizens like me can see what our governments are paid, we can make sure money is being spent on vital services. Corruption deprives nations of their future. If enough of you join with me we can help put an end to this trillion dollar scandal. Tutu Alicante, EG Justice is an African organization that campaigns for human rights, the rule of law, transparency and citizen participation in Equatorial Guinea. |
The fight against famine continues
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“Famine outcomes no longer exist in southern Somalia”. These eight words, at the start of a dry assessment released on Friday by the Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit in Nairobi, can hardly be considered a cause for celebration. For the last four months, a part of the world had been struck by famine – not just food shortage, or even extreme hunger, but the appalling conditions that meet the strict technical definition of a famine. As ONE insisted, no f-word could be more obscene. Drought may be inevitable, but famine is not – and famine in the 21st century is an obscenity. So it’s difficult to jump for joy at the news that this famine has come to an end – not least because millions of people in the Horn of Africa are still in desperate need. In Somalia especially, where new concerns about access for humanitarian organisations are emerging, the famine has left people more vulnerable than ever. Like a determined boxer who hauls himself to his feet after taking a beating, the next punch could be the most devastating of all. And yet, the fact remains that while the world took too long to act on early warnings of crisis in 2011, it did act. Millions of people, from ordinary citizens to policymakers, stepped forward. The global African diaspora demanded action. 400,000 people signed ONE’s petition urging leaders to do more. Leading politicians responded in the European Commission, the African Union, the UK, Sweden and Kenya. Millions of people contributed to the UN’s most successful humanitarian appeal and record public appeals in Britain, Germany and countless other countries. Critically, aid workers from Africa and across the world delivered relief in the most challenging of conditions, and continue to do so right now. All these actions saved lives. And now this belated but strong effort has been rewarded with a little good fortune. Somalia has enjoyed a better-than-expected harvest. That has pushed food prices down in local markets and there is, for now at least, room to breathe. Now the obvious question: can we stop this happening again? If political promises made years ago had been kept in the first place, we could have avoided much of the terrible human cost of the last few months. They must be kept now – by African governments who promised to invest ten per cent of their money on agriculture, and by richer nations who made commitments at the G8. And of course it isn’t just about money. More progress was made at last year’s Cannes G20 summit to reduce the volatility in global food prices that has caused havoc in the poorest families’ budgets. That progress needs to be built on urgently. Together, we managed to force action on this famine over the last few months. Let’s keep that pressure up. We need to build a movement that can keep food and agriculture at the top of the agenda. The US, who host this year’s G8 summit, have a big leadership role. The Horn of Africa’s wealthy neighbours in the Gulf are global players too, well able to do their part. And governments in Europe must keep their promises, starting with the British-led conference on Somalia later this month. Overcoming extreme hunger is not just a fight we must face. It’s one we can win. |
ONE member meets a Canadian MP with a heart for Africa
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As we continue our campaign to protect critical Canadian international development funding, ONE member Sarah Stone, from Waterloo, Ontario, reports back from meeting her local Member of Parliament.
Mr. Braid had recently returned from a trip to South Sudan as part of his role as the Vice Chair of the Canada-Africa Parliamentary Association whose main purpose is to discuss trade, aid and strengthen ties with African parliamentarians. During this trip, and on previous trips to Africa, Mr. Braid has seen first hand the benefits of Canadian foreign aid. We discussed my involvement in the Griot Project, and my recent trip to Washington this past December to participate in #ONErocksDC – the lobby day on Capitol Hill and the White House Leadership Series briefing day. I provided Mr. Braid with a Living Proof brochure and ONE armband and shared some of the issues that ONE is very passionate about including encouraging the governments of both Canada and the US to NOT make any cuts to their foreign aid budgets, the benefits of childhood vaccinations and ensuring that no child is born with HIV/AIDS by 2015. I directed him to the recent petition on the ONE website in which Canadians are encouraged to ask Prime Minister Harper to protect the Canadian foreign aid budget – you can sign the petition here. I expressed my pride as a Canadian that my own government has been supportive of these issues as evidenced by the $1.1 billion in funding for the Muskoka Initiative on Maternal, Newborn and Child Health, in addition to pledging to maintain current funding levels of $1.75 billion over five years for similar initiatives. I expressed my concern for any threat to the foreign aid budget and my desire that Prime Minister Harper would honour his commitment to the world’s poor and most vulnerable and not make any cuts to these important programs. Mr. Braid was appreciative of the work of the ONE Campaign and expressed his support of our endeavours. Sarah Stone |
As a constituent and on behalf of ONE I had the opportunity recently to meet with Peter Braid, Conservative Member of Parliament for Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario.Norman Lamb takes critical anti-corruption role
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Liberal Democrat Norman Lamb has today been appointed to a new Ministerial posting in the UK’s Business Department. Among his responsibilities will be leading for the UK on the European-wide negotiations for a strong European extractives transparency law. ONE has been campaigning on this issue along with our partners in the Publish What You Pay coalition, and we are now looking to Lamb to play a critical role in helping millions of African citizens get access to the information they need to hold their governments accountable for revenues received from extractive industries. Lamb will be the UK representative at a key meeting on the 20th February in Brussels when Ministers from around Europe will meet for the first time to discuss the new law. Next week ONE will be launching a petition to the Ministers attending that meeting asking them to stand firm in the face of heavy industry lobbying and help put an end to the secrecy status quo which is helping to perpetuate the resource curse. It continues to be a scandal that despite African countries receiving $1.5 trillion from natural resources in the past 5 years, some of the most resource-rich countries continue to suffer from insecurity and high levels of poverty. In Equatorial Guinea, for example, 1 in 12 children die before reaching their first birthday yet by some indicators they are wealthier per capita than France. We know transparency is not a solution to this problem alone – but it is a vital first step. Norman Lamb has the opportunity to do something great in the next few months, and show he is on the side of some of the poorest people in the world. If he stands firm and refuses to include the legislation wrecking exemptions and watering down of key details that some rogue companies are looking for – he will be a hero to millions. As ONE activists and members we’ll be looking for your support to help make this happen. P.S. If you have time take a moment to tweet @normanlamb welcoming him to his new post and asking him to play his part in passing a strong European extractive transparency law. |
How well do you know your MDGs?
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The Millennium Development Goals or MDGs are mentioned regularly by ONE (and many other campaigning organisations) – but how well known are they? Could you list all 8? And do you how many are likely to have been met by their target date of 2015? The MDGs are a set of poverty-busting targets agreed by 189 nations in the year 2000. They cover hunger and extreme poverty, education, gender equality, child mortality, maternal health, AIDS / HIV, Malaria and other diseases, environmental sustainability and a commitment to global cooperation for development. As a quick guide we’ve put together a new page that explains the MDGs and progress towards them, do have a look and share with your networks – we will continue to update this page as the clock ticks closer to 2015.
Please also urge your friends and family to join ONE. Now more than ever we need to make sure we hold leaders to account over the promises they made to the world’s poor. |
Let’s Celebrate to Accelerate
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Ten years ago today, at a small press conference in New York, Bono and Bill Gates launched an activist entity called DATA, with start-up funds from Mr Gates, George Soros and Ed Scott. I was one of the founders, along with Bobby Shriver and Lucy Matthew, and appointed the executive director. Though we started small, our oh so clever acronymic name stood for audacious goals: to campaign on debt, AIDS, trade and aid in partnership with African activists – in return for African governments offering more democracy, accountability and transparency to their citizens. We aspired to be data-based activists with a transatlantic bipartisan strategy, blending pop and policy, so that those with extreme global power would be forced to deal with extreme local poverty – and take the historic opportunity before us to end it. This little unit evolved into ONE, and in partnership with others helped catalyse the Make Poverty History campaign, the Live 8 concerts and (RED), enabling tens of millions of people to take effective action against extreme poverty. Curiously, hardly anybody knows what all this, and the huge Jubilee Drop the Debt movement where we cut our activist teeth, really achieved. Some think it achieved nothing or even backfired. So by telling you now the aim is not to blow our own trumpet but to sound a loud alarm, because if people don’t get to know about the wild successes of these struggles, as well as lessons learned from some big failures, they won’t get what’s at stake if progress stalls and programmes get cut back. The statistics of success seem staggering. Maybe that’s part of the reason that people don’t know what’s been achieved; the super-sized statistics drown out more human-size stories. For example, since we and partners ramped up our campaigning for access to life preserving anti-AIDS medication, access increased – from only 50,000 people in Africa receiving the life-saving anti-retrovirals in 2002 to over five million people receiving the drugs in 2010. Such huge inhuman numbers have millions of human faces. Grace and Agnes are two HIV positive Ugandan activists who, when we first met them a decade ago, weren’t able to get the drugs they needed to keep them healthy. Their friends were dying in droves; surely they would themselves depart soon. They had formed a solidarity group, the AIDS Support Organisation, to sing to each other and find strength in the face of this daily struggle, and spread a hopeful message of AIDS prevention to those not yet infected. I recall our fury that these brilliant people would die so prematurely, leaving a generation of AIDS orphans. Yet just two weeks ago – ten years to the day after we first met them – we hung out with Grace and Agnes again, as the equatorial sun set on a veranda overlooking Lake Victoria. They are so alive and beaming with pride as they told us how, with a little help from their friends like Presidents Bush and Clinton, they’ve helped get nearly 300,000 more HIV positive Ugandans on to life-preserving, orphan-preventing medications. Scale this up to 5 million across Africa, and 6.6 million globally, and we see an achievement on an epic scale. It is one of humanity’s greatest recent endeavours. Yet it is a tale rarely told. The story is similar in the spread of bednets and medications to beat malaria, which have cut death rates in half in 11 African countries. It is similar for education, with 46.5 million more children in school across Africa, in part because of dropped debts. It is similar for vaccinations: 5.5 million deaths have been averted through investments in the GAVI alliance for simple childhood immunisations. And it is similar for AIDS, TB and malaria, with the Global Fund, also set up ten years ago, saving over 100,000 lives every month from these three killer diseases. It is hugely humbling to see a campaign you work for catch fire, shift from the margins to the mainstream and know that for each of the millions of lives changed, there are a million others on the other side of the planet across seemingly vast divides, who reached out in partnership. Real people believing in each other and working together to change the world. But there is no room for smug self-congratulation as the struggles against disease, inequality and illiteracy are far from over, and especially as we learn the lessons of three scandalous oversights: on food security, on trade, and on support for African civil society and their drive for improved transparency and accountability. Firstly, we were all far too late to campaign for increased investments into food security until the price of food spiralled out of control, hitting the poorest hardest. Still nearly a billion people go hungry every day. Thankfully, the combined leadership of Kofi Annan, Bill Gates and President Obama has put the importance of food security back on the map. But there’s still much, much more to do. Secondly, we never got going on trade. Despite repeated efforts, the Doha Trade Round is dead, and the often promised Development Round has delivered nothing. Yet steps can – and must – still be taken, for example to support intra-African trade and integration, and provide greater access to all developed markets for African goods, quota and duty free. The better news is on investment as word of Africa’s booming economies has transformed perceptions. Ten years ago the Economist called Africa the “hopeless continent”. In December, the Economist wrote of an “Africa Rising”. Thirdly, calls from African civil society for greater transparency and accountability have often been paid politically correct lip service, but real support was scarce. Now we’re trying to make up for lost time, in particular by backing activists’ calls for oil, gas and other extractive companies to “publish what they pay” governments for the right to extract natural resources. This will allow citizens to scrutinise official accounts and reduce space for corruption. Indeed, all public finances must be made more transparent and all projects more rigorously monitored for impact, especially by the marginalised – the very people these projects are intended to help. In the last ten years new technologies – led by the mobile phone and social media – make it now much more possible to turbocharge such transparency drives. It’s an understatement to say that the world has changed utterly this last ten years, in some ways better, some worse. We’ve witnessed serious failures of political and corporate leadership bring on a devastating financial crisis. We’ve also seen that it is leadership from the people that is more often what inspires. From the Arab street to the millions of people delivering lifesaving support to each other on an epic scale we, as citizens and as organised global civil society, can change the course of history. In the face of such progress, and so many remaining challenges and opportunities, the abiding lesson must be that cynicism is unacceptable, apathy is the enemy, to care can be cool. There are grounds for optimism, for hope – for when we work together as one, across political divides, oceans, ethnicities, and beliefs we’ve seen we can achieve awesome results. With so much more to do forgive us if we celebrate – for it’s the best way to accelerate. This post first appeared on the Huffington Post UK website |
Paul Collier backs European transparency law
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Guest post from Paul Collier, author of ‘The Plundered Planet: How to Reconcile Prosperity With Nature’ and member of ONE’s Africa Policy Advisory Board.
Repetition is not inevitable. For example, Germany learnt from hyperinflation. But to avoid a repeat of the resource curse the pressures for plunder must be faced down. Some of the necessary actions must be taken by the governments of resource-rich countries, but we ourselves need to take complementary actions. Fortunately we are now at a moment of opportunity, and Germany’s support will be crucial. The European Commission has published proposals that would oblige all European extractive industry companies to become more transparent in their operations abroad. If enacted, these companies will have to publish the payments they make to the governments of every country where they operate. The legislation aims to go at least as far as ground-breaking US legislation that was passed in 2010. This means that a global standard for legally binding transparency in the extractive industries is within reach for the first time. The French President is in full support of this initiative. Even Britain, where more extractive companies’ are headquartered than in any other EU-member state, used a G20 finance ministers meeting to express unequivocal backing. It is unsettling that the German government, a champion of extractive transparency in years past, is silent at this historic moment. The draft disclosure requirements will provide the perfect complement to actions taken within the poor countries themselves. Citizens need the data that would be made available by these companies to better hold their governments accountable for the money they receive for the country’s natural resources. Over 600 civil society organisations worldwide have signed up to the ‘Publish What You Pay’ coalition. Citizens, many of whom have risked arrest to fight embezzlement, will be newly empowered with the tools they need to force positive change. As the Arab Spring so ably demonstrated, ordinary citizens care deeply about transparent and accountable governance. Of course transparency is only a means to an end. The prize is the better use of huge resource revenues, enabling a dramatic improvement in social and economic development. In 2008 exports of oil, gas and minerals from Africa were worth roughly nine times the value of overseas aid ($393-billion versus $44-billion), creating considerable government income through licences and taxes. In many countries those revenues account for the vast majority of government revenues – more than 80% in the case of Angola. Even if enhanced transparency were only to improve the efficiency of natural resource revenue spending incrementally, it would easily yield more than Germany’s entire aid program for sub-Saharan Africa. In a time of economic austerity across Europe policies like these which help African governments to mobilise their own resources for development are even more important. Aid budgets are now under pressure. In the long-run, fostering greater reliance on taxes can help develop cohesive states and reduce aid dependency. The discussions on the detail of the new European legislation are now critical. For the new legislation to effectively empower citizens in situations like this, it needs to include the disclosure of financial information at the project level. Only these disaggregated figures give citizens and local communities the information to hold government accountable. In addition, financial information only at the country level will not help citizens curtail the official under-pricing of national assets, such as the case of the Democratic Republic of Congo where contracts have officially been sold for a sixteenth of the market price – an indication that kick-backs are taking place. Project-level disclosure is also a way to improve the functioning of the natural resource market and therefore makes good business sense: wide discrepancies in the valuation of assets can be hidden by aggregating data at the country-level. A more efficient market system can operate if this secrecy ends. It is no coincidence that major investors successfully joined hands with civil society to have project –level disclosure included in the ground-breaking US legislation. The good news is: the current draft of the European Commission includes project-level disclosure and both the French President Sarkozy and the British Premier Cameron support this critical detail. Germany has been a strong champion for extractive transparency ever since the Heiligendamm G8 summit. This is evidenced by the long-standing support Germany gave to EITI, a voluntary multi-stakeholder transparency initiative that has worked well in resource rich countries that showed the will to improve their transparency. However, it is for those countries which ignore EITI that the new legislation is needed and Germany can reinforce its role as an international leader on extractive transparency by supporting the new law. But while the German government has indicated its general support for this EU legislation some European partners have noticed that a number of German ministries remain sceptical of the key feature described above: project-level disclosure. In line with its excellent track record on improving extractive transparency, Germany should now endorse the current strong legislation. Improved accountability in the natural resource sector leads to more stability in resource rich countries and better markets – both central aims of the German resource strategy. We are now at a rare moment: we know that some legislation will be enacted. But as with all legislation, the devil is in the detail. Lobbyists for the interests of continuing plunder and irresponsible business practices are attempting to dilute key features while paying lip-service to noble objectives. If we permit the lobbyists to win we become complicit in frustrating change: remember, the default option is for the current resource booms to be the biggest missed opportunity for poverty reduction in history. Germany needs to decide now whether it is happy to be complicit in frustrating this chance for change or if it wants to join the fight against a repetition of the hugely destructive resource curse. This post first appeared in the Handelsblatt newspaper. |
The ‘resource curse’ is one of the most persistent paradoxes of international development. For decades the natural resources of poor countries have been plundered: the few expropriating what should benefit the many, and the current generation squandering what should also benefit future generations. The current global boom in commodities provides many poor countries with an unprecedented opportunity to escape poverty, yet the default option is for history to repeat itself. One of the most pressing issues in the fight against global poverty is how to prevent this repetition.Peering into Ghana’s mobile future with Mac-Jordan Degadjor
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Mac-Jordan Degadjor is a Ghanaian social media entrepreneur and rising star among global tech bloggers. The 26-year-old recently spoke about the positive effects of social media at the TEDxYouthInspire conference in Ghana’s capital city of Accra and was spotlighted in the Christian Science Monitor’s “Thirty Ideas from People Under 30.” We asked Mac-Jordan to explain why mobile tech advancements are important for Ghana’s economic and social growth.
Why is Ghana ready for a mobile technology boom? Are investors looking to Ghana as a market ready to advance with mobile? New opportunities are showing up that make it possible for low-income economies to leapfrog other countries by adopting technologies that are suitable to their specific circumstances. I’m happy to say that Ghana is taking that bold step in adopting new mobile technologies. Take a critical look at the continent: Africa has more than 110 million Internet users, a number that is poised to grow by 2400 percent in this decade alone. What about Ghana’s market makes it ready for mobile phone technology? How are smartphones being introduced into the market? Can bandwidth improvements keep up with the technology? African governments are aggressively developing broadband and information/communications (ICT) policies in order to properly regulate the industry while allowing the market to work its magic. In Ghana, mobile penetration currently stands at 85.5 percent, which means that out of a population of about 25 million, there are 20 million subscribers to at least one of the country’s five active mobile networks (MTN, Vodafone, TiGO, Airtel and Expresso). These days, smartphones are being used in all areas. By 2013, Africa will have 11 undersea cables (including one in Ghana by Glo Mobile), which is likely to result in increased bandwidth and reduced cost to consumers. From banking to agriculture, mobile technology plays a vital role in the life of the average Ghanaian. Here are two examples of how mobile or smartphones are being used in Ghana: Esoko is an agricultural market information platform managed on the web and delivered via mobile technology in Ghana and other parts of Africa. Individuals, agri-business, and government agencies use Esoko to collect and send out market data using simple text messaging. By way of SMS, the Esoko platform provides automatic and personalized price alerts to farmers in rural areas. The Grameen Foundation is also developing and distributing mobile phone-based applications to help the poor better manage their health, through such programs as the Mobile Technology for Community Health (MOTECH) initiative.
How are younger people in Ghana helping to push mobile advancements? As a younger person, why is tech growth so important to you and your circles? Mobile technology is the future for Africa. In Ghana, the only way to access the Internet among the younger generation is via mobile and smartphones. The greatest opportunity for growth will come from technological innovation and the adoption of new technologies in service sectors, such as banking, insurance, health, education and agriculture. These growths in technology are very important to me and my networks because they help shape the socioeconomic aspect of our lives and bridge the gap between people in Ghana and those in other parts of the world.
Can you describe some of the apps that could come from tech innovations that would help people in Ghana? The catalog of mobile applications in Ghana seems to be growing by the day. We have a host of programs including mobile banking, SMS alerts for farmers and agri-business, chat functions, stock market updates and photo-sharing platforms. When it comes to mobile apps from Africa, there’s been mention of Ushahidi, iCow and Mocality from Kenya, and Ummeli and TXTALert from South Africa. In Ghana, app providers like Nkyea, Esoko, ShopAfrica53, NandiMobile, iWallet – Dream Oval, Retail Tower and Streemio have gained a lot of popularity. Can you describe the benefits, if any, to government transparency and democracy that mobile tech can bring to Ghana (e.g. promoting accountability, coordinating political events, and inspiring social activism)? Universal access to affordable information is one area in which mobile technology will be of great importance in Ghana. There is widespread consensus that ICTs offer one solution to this problem, with mobile phones showing particular promise already. In Ghana, smartphones are more affordable than computers. They require less infrastructure, do not demand much technological knowledge (users do not even have to be literate), and are very durable. With increased use of mobile phones in Ghana, citizen participation in all social aspects of life will be monitored and reported. As a citizen journalist, the mobile phone serves as a great tool in my reporting and social activism. Bloggers in Ghana will use their mobile phones to monitor and report on the December elections later this year. This will be first time citizens have the chance to play a participatory role in the elections. Read more from Mac-Jordan Degadjor on his blog or follow him on Twitter. He also writes for the Venture Capital for Africa blog. |
The African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance – you better take it seriously!
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In three weeks, the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance will enter into force. The Charter was adopted by the African Union (AU) five years ago. Now that fifteen member states have ratified it, the Charter becomes legally binding and operational. Guinea-Bissau, Nigeria and Cameroon were the 13th, 14th and 15th countries to ratify the Charter. Why should we bother about this document? A Charter that was ratified in majority by countries that don’t lead by example in terms of good governance; a Charter that might be just another paper tiger without any teeths; one of a range of legal documents that don’t change anything about the real lives of African citizens? Not quite. The African Charter actually doesn’t contain many new elements. But, much more important, it summarizes and reconfirms existing African engagements on good governance that the continent’s leaders have taken over the last thirty years or so. And the Charter takes them a step further, in operationalizing their implementation. So instead of adding to the pile, it tries to rationalize the African good governance architecture and improve its translation into reality. Though the African Charter doesn’t reinvent the wheel, it still is a leading international convention in terms of good governance. First of all because the principles of the AU, which are enshrined by the Charter, are very far-reaching. For instance the AU has the right to take action in case of an unconstitutional change of government in one of its member states. Second, because the Charter is the only international convention that dares to take up the sensitive issue of democracy, while other treaties prefer sticking to human rights principles or anti-corruption measures. The African Charter has already proved to be a useful tool. One of the first countries to ratify was Mauritania – just before a coup hit the country. In order to negotiate the return to constitutional order, the AU took the Charter as reference point. At that moment, the Charter was strictly speaking not yet legally applicable because it had not entered into force, but this didn’t matter as Mauritania had endorsed it. As this example suggests, the fact that the Charter has been ratified by some not-so-democratic countries is an encouraging sign, rather than simply a basis for criticism. These are the countries that potentially will need the Charter and in which this legal document could make a difference. Last but not least, the process of the Charter itself should be acknowledged. After having been adopted by the AU in 2007, only four countries had ratified it after more than four years! So the Charter was at risk of disappearing before even having really entered the stage. The Pan-African Parliament took on this challenge. This Parliament, also called the PAP, is the equivalent of the European Parliament, but with some small differences: the African body has around 50 employees, the EU parliament 6000. The European Union parliamentarians have an official role in decision-making, the African Union parliamentarians are still limited to a consultative role. Knowing its limits, the Parliament partnered with civil society and launched a campaign called “11 before 2011” in order to get to 15 ratifications, the number needed for the Charter to enter into force. It took a lot of lobbying, several regional conferences, a documentary on TV, outreach to student activists in several countries and a year longer than initially planned, but now the campaign has reached its goal. Congratulations! Though this is not where the work ends: now the goal is to have the rest of the 53 AU member states ratify the Charter! |
Vulture fund update
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We’ve been campaigning alongside the Jubilee Debt Campaign to see an end to vulture funds using Jersey’s courts to prey on poor countries for old debt. And last night Senator Ian Gorst, Jersey’s Chief Minister, announced plans to do so by introducing a law against vulture funds, as made permanent in the UK last year. Over 26,000 of you in the UK signed our petition calling for this to happen. Very rarely are issues without grey areas, but companies just shouldn’t be able to behave in this way, and stop the poorest of countries getting back on their feet. And that’s what we’ve said as ONE to Jersey’s Chief Minister – and we’ve been heard. In announcing these new plans, Senator Gorst said that:
We hope this means that the law will be introduced imminently, so countries like the DRC have a chance to stand up against these vultures. We may well still have more to do, and will keep you updated on Jersey’s promise, but for now, thank you for helping right this wrong. |
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About the Blog
The International ONE Blog is a daily log of the anti-poverty movement. The site is operated by ONE staff, with guest contributions from ONE volunteers, members and allies.
The content of each post and each comment represents the views of that author and does not necessarily reflect the views of ONE. ONE does not support or oppose any candidate for elected office, and any post expressing support or opposition for a candidate is not endorsed by ONE.
TAGS: Africa, Corruption, Equatorial Guinea, Transparency