The other day I got a phone call from a friend urging me to fast for international debt relief, and in particular to put pressure on Congress to pass The Jubilee Act (H.R. 2634) for responsible lending and expanded debt cancellation.  Poor countries around the world cannot provide their people with basic services such as clean water, public education, or rudimentary health care, she lamented, because they must service their often odious and illegitimate debts to wealthy nations and institutions.  In the name of Jesus, she told me, we’ve all got to do something!

I laughed. 

Get with the program, I told her. Bono, Jubilee USA and the rest of us do-gooders took on international debt in 2000, and in 2005 we got promises from President Bush, other world leaders, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to cancel more than $40 billion worth of debt for 20 of the world’s most impoverished countries.  Because debt cancellation has proven itself over and over again as a tool for releasing resources to fight poverty and build infrastructure, it was just a matter of time before the rest of those bad loans were forgiven as well.  It’s high time we moved on, I told my friend.

This time she laughed.  The she explained.

It turns out that those 2005 promises came with all kinds of strings attached, including some economic conditions that would actually increase poverty in poorer nations while enriching their foreign investors, and that they failed to include at least 27 of the world’s poorest nations.  The truth is that, when it comes to international debt relief, we’ve only just begun.

Of course, I didn’t just take her word for it.  Instead, I got back in touch with Bono and Jubilee USA in order to find out what is really going on and what I can do about it.  OK, what I really did was play a U2 CD while checking out Jubilee USA’s very straightforward website CLICK HERE making a few calls to some friends there who really know what they are talking about.  What I re-learned about how these debts came about in the first place absolutely horrified me.

Many were contracted by illegitimate dictators and repressive regimes, from lenders who well knew their money would go for arms and personal luxuries rather than vital development.  Often they were incurred by use of fraud, bribery, and coercion, and involved terms of payment that were unjust or impossible. Aside from the creditors, the local elites were the beneficiaries of these loans, and not the people.  Many of these debts lined the pockets of corrupt government officials.  Many loans to private corporations and cronies were guaranteed by governments and subsequently paid for with public funds after the loans were pocketed or wasted.

The bottom line:  On September 12 I’ll be fasting for international debt relief, calling my Congressman and Senator to urge them to support The Jubilee Act (H.R. 2634) for responsible lending and expanded debt cancellation, and calling on my friends to join me in doing the same sometime between now and Jubilee’s National Week of Action on October 15-17.  In the name of Jesus, I tell you, we’ve got to do something!

Don’t laugh…and don’t take my word for it, either.  Take a minute, go to the Jubilee USA website CLICK HERE and find out for yourself.

The other day I got a phone call from a friend urging me to fast for international debt relief, and in particular to put pressure on Congress to pass The Jubilee Act (H.R. 2634) for responsible lending and expanded debt cancellation.  Poor countries around the world cannot provide their people with basic services such as clean water, public education, or rudimentary health care, she lamented, because they must service their often odious and illegitimate debts to wealthy nations and institutions.  In the name of Jesus, she told me, we’ve all got to do something!

I laughed. 

Get with the program, I told her. Bono, Jubilee USA and the rest of us do-gooders took on international debt in 2000, and in 2005 we got promises from President Bush, other world leaders, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to cancel more than $40 billion worth of debt for 20 of the world’s most impoverished countries.  Because debt cancellation has proven itself over and over again as a tool for releasing resources to fight poverty and build infrastructure, it was just a matter of time before the rest of those bad loans were forgiven as well.  It’s high time we moved on, I told my friend.

This time she laughed.  The she explained.

It turns out that those 2005 promises came with all kinds of strings attached, including some economic conditions that would actually increase poverty in poorer nations while enriching their foreign investors, and that they failed to include at least 27 of the world’s poorest nations.  The truth is that, when it comes to international debt relief, we’ve only just begun.

Of course, I didn’t just take her word for it.  Instead, I got back in touch with Bono and Jubilee USA in order to find out what is really going on and what I can do about it.  OK, what I really did was play a U2 CD while checking out Jubilee USA’s very straightforward website CLICK HERE making a few calls to some friends there who really know what they are talking about.  What I re-learned about how these debts came about in the first place absolutely horrified me.

Many were contracted by illegitimate dictators and repressive regimes, from lenders who well knew their money would go for arms and personal luxuries rather than vital development.  Often they were incurred by use of fraud, bribery, and coercion, and involved terms of payment that were unjust or impossible. Aside from the creditors, the local elites were the beneficiaries of these loans, and not the people.  Many of these debts lined the pockets of corrupt government officials.  Many loans to private corporations and cronies were guaranteed by governments and subsequently paid for with public funds after the loans were pocketed or wasted.

The bottom line:  On September 12 I’ll be fasting for international debt relief, calling my Congressman and Senator to urge them to support The Jubilee Act (H.R. 2634) for responsible lending and expanded debt cancellation, and calling on my friends to join me in doing the same sometime between now and Jubilee’s National Week of Action on October 15-17.  In the name of Jesus, I tell you, we’ve got to do something!

Don’t laugh…and don’t take my word for it, either.  Take a minute, go to the Jubilee USA website CLICK HERE and find out for yourself.