Despite an unprecedented
challenge from two
developing-world
candidates, Washington's
66-year lock on the
World Bank Presidency
will almost certainly
remain intact when
directors meet Monday to
fill the post.
Even after one of the
challengers dropped out
on Friday to push his
support to the other --
Nigerian Finance Minister
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala --
they won't be able to
overcome US and
European backing for the
US nominee, health
expert Jim Yong Kim,
analysts say.
But the first-ever
challenge to traditional
American control of the
job has signaled that, as
with the International
Monetary Fund, emerging
economies are flexing
their muscles for a bigger
say in how the near
seven-decade old
institutions are run.
Bank directors say that
they aim for a consensus
decision when they meet
formally on Monday to
replace current President
Robert Zoellick, the
former US diplomat
incumbent who is leaving
in June at the end of his
five year term.
The position is crucial for
much of the developing
world. The President
oversees a staff of
9,000 economists,
development experts and
other policy specialists,
and a loan portfolio that
hit $258 billion in 2011.
Last year the bank
committed $43 billion to
new loans and grants,
helping diverse countries
to develop
infrastructure,
administration, and key
sectors of their
economies.
Bank experts say that Mr
Zoellick has done a good
job to unite a staff that
became dispirited under
his predecessor Paul
Wolfowitz, and credit him
with energizing the bank
to act during the
2008-2009 financial
crisis.
But they also say the
institution needs a new
direction that matches the
requirements of a much-
changed global economic
landscape. It needs a
cohesive vision for the
future, according to
former bank staffer
Katherine Marshall, now a
professor of government
at Georgetown University.
The race was taken
seriously early as the
United States appeared
unable to find a candidate
while Okonjo-Iweala and
Colombian economist and
former finance minister
Jose Antonio Ocampo
threw their names into
the hat.
Both were lauded as
viable, with Okonjo-
Iweala, who spent some
25 years in various
positions at the bank,
earning prominent
endorsements.
But the White House
surprised all with the
nomination of Kim. Not a
banker or diplomat like
the previous Bank
Presidents, the Korean-
American physician is the
head of the Ivy League
Dartmouth College but is
also known for his work
with the World Health
Organization on fighting
AIDS in developing
countries.
"It's time for a
development professional
to lead the world's
largest development
agency," President
Barack Obama said.
Critics, however, raised
doubts about Kim's lack
of experience across the
broad realm of
development economics.
But he traveled to
around a dozen countries
to introduce himself,
apparently convincingly
enough to earn solid
support.
Last week Bank directors
interviewed the three
candidates on how they
aimed to run the Bank, in
a process that aimed to
show that the choice is
made on merit rather
than old political
arrangements.
That gave rise to some
hopes that one of the
challengers might have a
chance.
Indeed, on Friday as
Brazil said that the BRICS
emerging economies --
Brazil, Russia, China,
India and South Africa --
would back one candidate
and Ocampo withdrew and
endorsed Okonjo-Iweala,
some hoped she might
have a fighting chance.
But Russia immediately
broke ranks and
endorsed Kim, almost
guaranteeing that the
tradition that Washington
names the World Bank
head and Europe
supplies the leader of the
Internationnal Monetary
Fund (IMF) is likely to go
unchanged.
"The only way around
that is if European
countries refuse to back
the US candidate. In the
current context, it
doesn't seem likely," said
Daniel Bradlow, a law
professor at American
University in Washington.
But former Bank
economist Uri Dadush
said the emergence of a
competition did count for
something.
"Before, when there was
only one candidate, the
US backing counted for
99 per cent and merit for
one per cent," he said.
"Now, with several
candidates, merit counts
more but it not the
essential thing."
Peter Chowla of the
Bretton Woods Project,
which monitors the
behavior of the World
Bank and IMF, said the
process only appeared to
be more open.
Developing countries
"don't have the requisite
voting power at the
Bank, because the
Europeans and the
Americans have stalled
reforms for decades."
"We still have what is
essentially an
appointment by the
American President," he
said.
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