'Bury the debt' is part of international calls for action
18th January 2005
On Tuesday 18 January, debt campaigners in over 20 countries, as far apart as Finland, Yemen and Uganda, mobilised to call for the full cancellation of debts owed by the poorest countries. Campaigners targeted the Canadian, French, German, Italian, Japanese, UK and US embassies around the world, calling on these countries to drop the debt.
The action came before finance ministers of the G7, the world’s richest countries, meet on February 4th in London. Campaigners are calling on the G7 to seize the opportunity at these meetings to cancel the debt.
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| 10 Downing St, 18 January 2005. Credit: Olivia Hemingway |
Campaigners made their voices heard through a wide range of actions, by staging protests, marches and media stunts, meeting with embassy representatives, delivering letters, issuing statements or holding press conferences. In Zambia, for example, campaigners from around the country held a protest march targeting the Canadian and Japanese embassies. Life expectancy in Zambia is just 33 years and 1 in 10 children die in childbirth, yet the Government this year is forced to spend more on repaying debts than on health.
In the UK, Jubilee Debt Campaign and World Development Movement, one of its member organisations, staged a 'debt funeral', demanding that G7 countries 'Bury the Debt, not the Dead'. Campaigners dressed as mourners and pall bearers processed with a black horse-drawn hearse, a coffin, and flowers spelling out 'Bury the Debt' to the London embassies of the G7 countries and the official residences of the Prime Minister and Chancellor [Finance Minister]. (See press release.) The event drew attention to the fact that debt kills: every day, 30,000 children die because of poverty, while every day, the most impoverished countries are forced to give over £30 million in debt repayments to the rich world.
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| Tanzanian civil society organisations meet with the German Embassy, 18 January 2005 |
In Tanzania, delegations from citizens groups met with the German and Canadian ambassadors to urge them to go further with debt cancellation. In 2005 Tanzania will pay out $110 million in debt service. If this debt was cancelled the government could increase health spending by 50 percent. Two out of every ten children in Tanzania die before their 5th birthday.
In Tajikistan, an NGO conference focused on the need for debt cancellation and ways to participate in the Global Call to Action Against Poverty. A number of letters were sent to G7 representatives, signed in total by nearly 1,000 organisations and active individuals.
Other actions took place in countries including
Armenia,
Finland,
France,
Germany,
Ghana,
Ireland,
Italy,
Mozambique, the
Netherlands,
Nigeria,
Norway,
Scotland,
Sweden,
Tajikstan,
Tanzania,
Uganda, the
UK,
Yemen and
Zambia. Some of the statements issued by civil society as part of the Day of Action are available to download on the right of this page.
Jack Jones Zulu of Jubilee Zambia, which staged a protest march in Lusaka targeting particularly the Canadian and Japanese embassies, said, "
There will never be sustainable human development if the debt is not cancelled. We did not experience the tsunami but we live with these conditions every day. Our people are dying because of debt, because we do not have the money for hospitals and drugs. That is why we are joining with others to present this message, we want to make a global impact."
