Ayanna Nahmias, Editor-in-Chief
Last Modified: 00:16 AM EDT, 17 April 2012
WASHINGTON, DC – The World Bank announced today that they selected President Barack Obama’s nominee Jim Yong Kim to serve as its president. Mr. Kim has been selected to replace the out-going president Mr. Robert B. Zoellick.
Mr. Kim, a Korean-American doctor, will be the first leader of the institution who doesn’t come to the post with a financial pedigree. He successfully challenged the Nigerian nominee, Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, and Colombia’s former finance minister and development expert, Jose Antonio Ocampo.
“During the bank’s 68-year history, an American has always headed the institution, while the top job at its sister organization, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), traditionally goes to a European. But emerging economies have recently been contesting that informal arrangement at both the IMF and the World Bank and presenting their own candidates.” (Source: VOA)
Although, some of the Bank’s 187 members have expressed concern that Kim lacks the requisite financial acumen to head the institution, other view his tenure as the director of the World Health Organization and a co-founder of global non-profit Partners in Health as vital to his understanding of the needs of the countries to which the World Bank provides financial and technical assistance.
President Paul Kagame of Rwanda gave a ringing endorsement of Kim, as he reflected upon the dedicated support he provided in helping Rwanda to restore its health system. He went so far as to say, “Kim is a true friend of Africa and well known for his decade of work to support us in developing an efficient health system in Rwanda.”
When Kim headed the World Health Organization he successfully implemented a program to increase access to affordable HIV drugs in the developing world. He was tenacious in his efforts to extend treatment for HIV and AIDS to over 7 million people in developing nations.
Kim’s nomination has become controversial, with opponents angered by the upset of the pro forma appointment of wealthy nominees being selected to lead the institution, and in the process enrich themselves and their cronies; and proponents who believe that it is time for a new selection process and applaud the US’ bold move in nominating an unlikely candidate.
It is fitting that President Obama would take the bold step of appointing an outsider to ‘change’ an entrenched culture and reform an organization which has lost sight of its mission to assist countries better support and improve the lives of their citizenry.
Kim will begin his five-year tenure in July 2012.
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![Rehtaeh Parsons, a teen from Nova Scotia, was a gorgeous, kind, straight-A student with her whole life ahead of her. On Thursday, she hung herself in her bathroom. On Sunday night, her family took her off life-support. Approximately a year and a half earlier, in November 2011, when Rehtaeh was 15 years old, she was reportedly gang-raped by four boys, classmates of hers. The trauma did not end there. One of the boys reportedly took a photo of the act and circulated it among Rehtaeh’s school and community where, as noted, by Rehtaeh’s mother, “it quickly went viral.” Authorities reportedly investigated the sexual assault but claimed there was insufficient evidence to make formal charges. Rehtaeh’s mother recalls the investigation: They didn’t even interview the boys until much, much later. To me, I’d think you’d get the boys right away, separate them…. Nothing was done about [the photos] because they couldn’t prove who had pressed the photo button on the phone. [She was told that the distribution of the photos is] not really a criminal issue, it’s more of a community issue. Even though she was 15 at the time, which is child pornography…. The whole case was full of things like that. We didn’t have a rape kit done because we didn’t even know (anything had happened) until several days later when she had a breakdown in my kitchen. She was trying to keep it to herself. Tormented and bullied, Rehtaeh was forced to leave her school and tried to start fresh in a new community. Despite efforts, she continued to struggle, at one point checking into a hospital to cope with suicidal thoughts, anger, and depression. In an extensive post on a Facebook memorial page, her mother Leah Parsons described how the straight-A high school student became depressed and suicidal after the incident. “The person Rehtaeh once was all changed one dreaded night in November 2011. She went with a friend to another’s home. In that home she was raped by four young boys . . . one of those boys took a photo of her being raped and decided it would be fun to distribute the photo to everyone in Rehtaeh’s school and community where it quickly went viral,” Leah Parsons wrote. “Because the boys already had a ‘slut’ story, the victim of the rape Rehtaeh was considered a slut. “This day changed the lives of our family forever.” Rehtaeh, who was a 15-year-old high school student in Cole Harbour at the time, was repeatedly bullied at school and “suddenly shunned by almost everyone she knew.” “She was never left alone. She had to leave the community. Her friends turned against her. People harassed her. Boys she didn’t know started texting her and Facebooking her asking her to have sex with them. It just never stopped,” her mother told CBC.](http://ayannanahmias.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/rehtaeh-parsons-17-canadian-rape-victim-commits-suicide-3.jpg?w=45&h=45&crop=1){kind=small}
17/04/2012 at 14:21
I think this is a brave step forward.
17/04/2012 at 00:31
Reblogged this on The Revivers and commented:
BRIC and other countries can do better than complain. They have enough capital to establish a World Bank II of their own. It would also take some load off from World Bank I. In WBII they can have their own democratic system of selecting a president.