Nothing explains China’s
astronomical rise to power and rapid world domination like the recent World
Bank Group scandal of corruption, unethical conduct, and favoritism. To become a
prominent world player in the span of two decades, China had to have “partners
in corruption” in international organizations, to help it paint a false image about
itself and to lure investors into a fake economic setup, at the expense of
honest nations.
اضافة اعلان
To no one’s surprise, we are
finally out of the realm of theory and speculation, with regards to corruption
and misconduct at World Bank Group (a viewpoint many anti-globalization
activists hold dear to their hearts), and possibly at the International
Monetary Fund (IMF). After all, the same official named in the bank’s scandal
is the sitting managing director of the IMF, none other than Bulgarian economist Kristalina Georgieva.
I do believe, though, she is
being thrown under the bus to make a quick case against China, as the tension
between the Asian nation and Washington intensifies across so many axes. This
isn’t to absolve the official of any wrongdoing, but to conclude that the scale
of corruption must be deeper than initially thought. I would also argue that
with China’s sweeping world domination, we might be looking at decades of
favoritism and data manipulation that helped the “red dragon” conquer an
unsuspecting world.
According to the CNN,
WilmerHale, the law firm tasked with an independent
investigation into the bank’s “Doing Business” reports, found that then-CEO
Georgieva pressured the team in 2017 to "change the report's
methodology" or "make specific changes" to data points, with the
sole purpose of boosting China's ranking in the 2018 edition. The Associated
Press adds, the office of Asian-American Jim Yong Kim, then the bank’s
president, also pressured staff members to change data on China to support
Beijing’s ranking in the report, among other countries.
The picture becomes starker
when we remember how a country like Jordan — honest, hardworking, and
well-meaning — often gets lashed with stringent World Bank Group policies, laced
with harsh and condescending evaluations that squeeze the soul out of this
patient nation.
Those recent revelations are
not just about corruption in skewing the methodology of a high-profile report.
This is about giving some nations more access to economic opportunity and
prosperity with the help of fake data, and at the expense of other nations.
As a Jordanian citizen who
is often lectured by self-righteous world organizations about “transparency”
and “reform” (empty words in light of recent revelations), I would like to ask
World Bank Group and the IMF the following: How much of that fake data was
included in reports about Jordan?
As a member of the middle
class, how many times did I have to pay taxes based on dubious economic
reports? How many times did Jordan lose economic opportunities and investments
based on one of your shady reporting methods? And how many times was I robbed
of the chance at a reasonable standard of living (that many in the West would
consider to be terrifyingly below their expectations), because my country was
denied a fair shot in life?
As it turns out, Jordan was indeed
the victim of unfair and corrupt treatment at the hands of a World Bank Group official.
An alarming Jordan News
report published on Monday says, a “former senior World Bank (Group) staff member allegedly
manipulated data to ensure that Saudi Arabia ranked first on the Top Improvers
list of the bank’s Doing Business 2020 report at the expense of Jordan’s no. 1
spot.”
How many more reports about
Jordan — from World Bank Group, the IMF, and similar bodies — have betrayed a
country breaking at the seams from a severe imbalance between the burden of
responsibility that we carry (from refugees to scare water resources), and the
wrong kind of policies, based on the wrong kind of data?
Although the current news cycle is focused on World
Bank Group specifically, there is nothing to stop us from assuming this is just
the tip of the iceberg when it comes to China’s (and in this instance, other
countries’) unethical ways around the world institutional landscape.
How do we know similar
corruption is not rife at organizations like the World Trade Organization, the
World Health Organization, or any other organization with corruptible officials
who can be swayed, probably with monetary incentive or psychological
manipulation that plays on their unchecked biases, to breach their
organizations’ code of ethics?
The world can offer no
guarantees that are no more nuanced and hard-to-discover schemes of corruption
and favoritism in all kinds of organizations that have the potential to help
boost Chinese agendas across a variety of landscapes, from politics to economy.
This said, for many
analysts, corruption and lack of moral values seems to be what sets China’s DNA
apart. From ethnic cleansing committed against the Uyghur Muslims in the
Xinjiang region, to predatory economic practices against vulnerable nations in
need of economic support, the Chinese Communist Party seems to have no clear
idea about what constitutes moral leadership, let alone engage in sound,
ethical, and transparent competitiveness on the world stage.
Let us take a step back to see
the big picture about China’s true value system. This is a regime that is
firmly rooted in Big Brother surveillance and a “social credit system,” designed
to bend the will of citizens and companies to the absolute viewpoint of the Chinese
Communist Party. I speak in more detail about this in a previous
opinion piece for Jordan News titled, “America’s ‘higher quality’ alternative to
China’s Belt-and-Road Initiative.”
Some think there is plenty
of evidence that points to a multilayered strategy designed by the Chinese
Communist Party to advance a predatory economic agenda that feeds on the vulnerabilities
of poor nations across the world, in a bid to entrench the party’s power beyond
mainland China.
In 2015, the New York Times
published an investigative report titled, “China’s Global Ambitions, Cash and
Strings Attached.” The article supports
the argument that with the absence of humanist core values to guide its
actions, China has indeed abused its power and “elevated status” by “forcing
countries to play by its financial rules, which can be onerous.”
The article goes on to say,
“Many developing countries, in exchange for loans, pay steep interest rates and
give up the rights to their natural resources for years. China has a lock on
close to 90 percent of Ecuador’s oil exports, which mostly goes to paying off
its loans.”
The moral of the story is
that the United States, the world’s only safety valve against further Made-in-China
infiltration and domination, should open a wide array of investigations into
every single world organization, including the UN, to see how much of policy
and decision-making has been influenced by China-leaning officials, feigning
objectivity and obviously corruptible global values.
Read more Opinion and Analysis
.jpg)
.jpg)
