Johannesburg - The World Bank will bestow economic and environmental problems on South Africa through the granting of a $3.75bn loan to power utility Eskom, social movement Jubilee South Africa said on Tuesday.
"The large size of the loan, as well as the signal that the
granting of the loan sends to other lenders to make further loans, will have serious economic repercussions," Jubilee said in a statement.
It said the World Bank was now not only a designer of the
country's social and economic policies, but a financier as well.
South Africa was standing at the threshold of the problems that
the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) had bestowed on other southern countries for many decades.
The social movement said the sanctions campaign during apartheid had actually shielded South Africa from the damage World Bank and IMF policies had caused in other countries.
"This supposed punishment was a blessing in disguise for
post-apartheid South Africa, in that the country, unlike its
counterparts in the rest of Africa and the South, had limited
obligations to these agencies."
Jubilee said that while the World Bank loan to Eskom was being
promoted as supporting development, "nothing could be further from the truth".
The loan was based on an intensification of coal-fired power.
"This requires the expansion of coal mining, entailing the
further dispossession of people from their land," Jubilee said.
"Coal-fired power stations need highly purified water, but
mining pollutes water, so people's water needs will also be
sacrificed."
The local effects would be exacerbated by the impact of the loan on carbon emissions and global warming, the impact of which was felt disproportionately in the south as altered weather patterns impacted on agriculture.
"The privileging of capital-intensive power stations over more
extensive small-scale renewable projects also impacts negatively on employment opportunities," Jubilee said.
Moreover, the negative impacts of local and global environmental destruction would be passed on to future generations.
"It is becoming increasingly evident to all that sustaining the
environment and engaging in appropriate development go hand in
hand.
"The collaboration between the World Bank, the government and
Eskom towards the granting of this loan represents an attack on
both the environment and the people."
Jubilee said it was on this basis that it opposed the loan "and, more broadly, any form of collaboration between South Africa and the World Bank".
Indeed, this loan is another glaring example of why the World
Bank should be shut down, Jubilee said.
- Sapa