Peoples Front against IFIs

We, peoples’ movements, mass organisations, struggle groups, trade unions, communityorganisations and many others from India and the Asia-Pacific region, call for a protestagainst the 46th Annual Board of Governors’ Meeting (AGM) of the Asian DevelopmentBank (ADB) in Greater Noida, Delhi during May 2-5, 2013. The AGM will make decisionson key development issues for the Asia-Pacific region, that will affect all of us now and inthe future. India, which is touted as ‘the emerging power in the region’ and in the ADB, ishosting the AGM for the third time to showcase and endorse a ‘development throughempowerment’ model put forth by the ADB. In fact, over the years, the Indian ruling classhas been working hand in glove with the ADB in a mutually beneficial complicity at theexpense of hundreds of millions of poor, marginalised and other toiling sections of thesociety.The ADB has earned the notorious title of actually being an “
 Anti-human DestructiveBank
,” whose devastating acts are not limited to India, but are evident across the Asia-Pacific region and also at the global level in collusion with the World Bank, InternationalMonetary Fund (IMF) and other institutions of global capitalism. Likewise, our protest andresistance is not limited to the ADB but extends to all International Financial Institutions(IFIs) whose primary missions are to appropriate and commodify the natural, human andsocial wealth of the planet, and force nations into indebtedness and political subordination. A self-acclaimed “development” financial institution, the ADB claims to combat poverty inthe region. But its poverty reduction strategy is merely a masquerade for prescribing adoomed model of rapid economic growth powered by the privatisation, commodificationand financialisation of natural resources and basic needs like water, power, education, etc.Under the guise of “good governance,” the ADB supports profit-mongering, un-accountableand non-transparent private sectors. The Long-Term Strategy Framework (Strategy 2020)of the Bank is a recipe for the transfer of wealth, means and capacities from the poor andmiddle classes to the wealthy, upper classes. Using grand slogans such as ‘inclusivegrowth’, ‘environmental sustainability’ and ‘regional integration’, the Strategy 2020 focuseson private sector development and explicitly advocates private sector participation in ADBand borrower operations. In 2011, the Bank spent nearly $6 billion as private sector finance. Not surprisingly, in India the number of billionaires rose from 2 with a combinedworth of $2 billion in the mid-1990s, to 46 in 2012 with a total net worth of $176 billion!With nearly $22 billion in annual financial investment for nearly 350 projects (loans, grants,equity investments and Technical Assistance) in Asia-Pacific, governments have given the ADB a mandate to direct the development path for the region. Under the pretext of addressing environmental and climate crises and alleviating poverty, the ADB continues todisplace and alienate large numbers of people from their lands, homes, water sources andforests, and violates their rights to livelihood, ctizenship and participation in decisionmaking.
Join hands against the ADB AGM
While it is our governments who borrow, the onus of debt repayment falls on the publicexchequer and the people of the country, and is transferred to subsequent generationsand the environment. Debt repayment depletes scarce foreign exchange reserves, andredirects national revenues away from spending on essential public goods such as
education, health, housing, water, sanitation, electricity and job-creation towards servicingan upward spiralling illegitimate debt.The struggles, movements and campaigns against ADB funded projects in West Bengal,Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Jharkhand,J&K, Himachal Pradesh, and the North Eastern States take this opportunity to expose the ADB’s collusion with the Indian Government to enable the concentration of wealth,resources and capacities in the hands of the economic-political elites. People led byvibrant struggles in these states to halt nuclear power, land and water grabbing, forcedevictions, anti-people laws, farmers suicides and environmental destruction send out thisappeal to challenge the asymmetrical, ill-designed and anti-people developmentprescriptions of the ADB.The 2013 ADB AGM in Delhi offers a much-needed opportunity for us to come together toexpose the destructive developmental model promoted by the ADB and our governments.We invite all of you to join us in voicing our opposition to institutions like the ADB, whichmutilate our democratic institutions, perpetrate untold violence on our societies and foster continuing marginalization and pauperization of our peoples.
ADB QUIT INDIA! QUIT ASIA!
PEOPLES FRONT against IFIsENDORSED BY
(27March’13)
:
India
: Adivasi Moolvasi Astitva Raksha Manch (Jharkhand), All India Forum of Forest Movements (AIFFM), All India Union of Forest Working people ( AIUFWP/NFFPFW), ANBALAYAM – Pondicherry , Andhra PradeshMuslim Organization, Bongiyo Paromparik Kaaru O Bastra Shilpi Sangho (West Bengal), Behavioural Science Centre (Ahmedabad), Bharat Jan Vigyan Jatha, Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU), CASA-ACT, CitizensForum for Mangalore Development, GM-Free Bihar Movement, Haldia Dock Complex Contractors Shramik Union, Himalaya Niti Abhiyan, India FDI Watch, Indian Social Action Forum (INSAF), Indianoil PetronasContractors Shramik Union, Janpahal, Kabani – the other direction,Kisan Manch, Kisan Sangharsh Samiti,KSMTF – Kerala Fishworkers Forum, Manthan Adhyayan Kendra, Mines, minerals & People (MmP), Nadi Ghati Morcha, National Fishworkers Forum, National Hawkers Federation, New Socialist Alternative(CWI-India), Paschim Banga Khet Majoor Samity, Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS), Radical Socialist,River basin Friends, South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers & People – SANDRP, Sundarban Banadhikar Sangram Committee, Tamil Solidarity & others
 Asia/International
: Alternatives Asia, Asia Europe Peoples Forum, Asia-Pacific Movement on Debt & Development (JubileeSouth), CADTM International Network, Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (ESSF, France), FOCUS on theGlobal South, Migrant Forum in Asia (MFA), Socialist Alternative (Australia)
 Asian Countries
:
Bangladesh
; EQUITYBD, Humanitywatch, Initiative for Right View – IRV, Nabodhara, Online KnowledgeSociety, Participatory Research Action Network-PRAN, VOICE
Indonesia
: Solidaritas Perempuan
Nepal
: All Nepal Peasants’ Federation (ANPFA), All Nepal Women’s association (ANWA), Forum for theProtection of Public Interest
Pakistan
: Awami Workers Party, Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum, Umeedenao Citizen Community Board
Philippines
: AMA- Aniban ng mga Manggagawa sa Agrikultura (Union of Agricultural Workers)
Sri Lanka
: Centre for Environmental Justice/Friends of the Earth, Federation of Media Employees Trade Unions
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