What Wolfowitz did right
Since taking the helm in 2005, Wolfowitz made the fight against corruption in poor countries a hallmark issue, waging an aggressive campaign that led to the suspension (temporary in most cases) of hundreds of millions of dollars in loans and contracts to nations including India, Chad, Kenya, Congo, Ethiopia and Bangladesh.
Wolfowitz threw his full weight behind his predecessor James Wolfensohn’s anti-corruption stance, prodding the bank into taking action.
Prior to this, the word ‘corruption’ was considered taboo and was omitted from development discourse. For 50 years the bank, in effect, had lent hundreds of billions of dollars to developing countries without ever publicly conceding or addressing the reality that some of the money ended up in the pockets of corrupt officials and companies.
While it is hard to quantify how much went ‘missing’, a 2004 study by a US Senate committee put the sum lost by the World Bank for development in the world’s poorest nations at about 100 billion dollars since 1946 — nearly 20% of its total lending portfolio.
While Wolfowitz’s anti-corruption approach met with much opposition within the bank itself, his goal of trying to make sure the money went to where it was supposed to go was undeniably the right and ethical one.
At best corruption can mean hospitals or patients having to overpay for services, at worst it can mean people dying because money meant for drugs for a sick child, or to build a hospital, are siphoned off into private bank accounts. In this way, corruption literally violates human rights as people are denied the care their governments are obliged to provide.
It is vital that the bank continues to give strong leadership on anti-corruption measures and not allow the issue fall off the agenda with a change of staff. The lives of millions depend on it.
John O’Shea
GOAL
PO Box 19
Dun Laoghaire
Co Dublin
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