May 18th marks the 10 year anniversary of Drop the Debt’s giant demonstration in Birmingham that called for the cancellation of third world debts. This year they will re-form in Birmingham to mark the occasion, remember what has been achieved, and call for further debt relief.
The debt crisis enjoyed a brief moment in the political spotlight around the turn of the millennium, and quite a lot was accomplished for the world’s poorest countries. Make Poverty History continued that work, but I get the feeling it’s dropped off the agenda a little. Hopefully the gathering on the 18th will remind the world that it still has promises to deliver, as the debt is still very much with us.
The problem now is actually delivering the debt relief that has been gradually announced over the last ten years. The main issue here is the long list of conditions that accompany the offer, often stacked in favour of richer nations – conditions include privatizing assets, opening up markets and liberalizing trade, and cutting public spending, all of which are likely to hurt the poor. This is all carried out through the IMF, who demand absolute compliance for at least three years before you can even begin their Heavily Indebted Countries Initiative. As has been well documented, the IMF is a deeply biased organization that has shown little care for the poor or real understanding of development. Much of the delay in delivering debt relief is down to their dogged application of the formula, making the governments of poor countries jump through economic hoops while their populations suffer and die. Some countries have successfully navigated the HIPC programme, including Madagascar I’m pleased to say, but it takes ten years, and that’s too long. We’ve had a decade of giving with one hand and taking away with the other, and we need to cut back the conditions.
To find out more about what you can do, visit the Jubilee Debt Campaign website. If you would like to go along to the Birmingham rally, the details are here.
- Having just moved to Luton, I’ve just been reading up on who my MP is so I could write to them about this issue. If you’re interested in doing this too, let me share a couple more links. You can find out more about who your MP is and what they’re interested in at Theyworkforyou.com. Once you know who you’re writing to (you need to write to your own MP), write a short letter that explains your point, and what you’d like them to do. There are some useful tips here at the Open rights group. Try not to use form letters or copied and pasted points, as these are essentially spam. But if it helps, my letter is here in Word format: third-world-debt-mp-letter
The Earthbound Report 