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New York City Mayor Eric Adams holds a rally with union leaders for mayoral accountability on the steps of City Hall on Monday, May 9, 2022. Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office
This image is excerpted from a U.S. GAO report:www.gao.gov/products/GAO-14-351
MISSILE DEFENSE: Mixed Progress in Achieving Acquisition Goals and Improving Accountability
Syrian activists, journalists and bloggers will provided first-person accounts of the situation in Syria at a special forum on the Opening Day of the 21st Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council: Bearing Witness: Human Rights and Accountability in Syria.
Opening Statements by
Ms. Navanethem Pillay
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Ms. Laura Dupuy Lasserre
President of the United Nations Human Rights Council
Moderator
Mr. Riz Khan
International Television Journalist and Author
Panelists
Mr. Muhanad al-Hassani
Human Rights Defender, Syria
Mr. Amer Matar
Syrian Journalist
Mr. Mohammad Abdallah
Syrian Journalist and Blogger in Exile
Ms. Lotte Leicht
Director, Human Rights Watch, Brussels Office
JUBA, 31 MAY 2023: The Human Rights Division of the UN Peacekeeping mission, UNMISS, hosted a consultation on promoting accountability and identifying key challenges within the justice system in Central Equatoria state. The forum brought together representatives from the local government, human rights institutions, civil society organizations, and justice actors. The objective is creating a space to enhance common.
understanding on the importance of human rights for all.
Photos by Isaac Billy/UNMISS
The Inspection Panel is completing 25 years in its role, as an accountability mechanism of the World Bank. As you are aware, the Bank’s failure to comply with its operating policies was seen by the entire world in the Bank’s financing with the Sardar Sarovar Dam project on River Narmada. The tenacity of massive grass-roots uprisings from our communities in the 80’s and the sustained hard work of our social movements along with our resoluteness to link it with international coalitions to question the hegemony of the Bank, subsequently led the Bank, for the first time, to commission an independent review of its project. The Independent Review Committee (Morse Committee) constituted by the Bank in 1991 to review the social and environmental costs and benefits of the dam, after years of consistent struggle by Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save Narmada Movement) and its allies led to a demand from the civil society around the globe for the creation of a grievance redressal system for project-affected communities, which ultimately pressurized the Bank to constitute the Inspection Panel in 1993. We expected this might be a crucial backstop and an opportunity for us to raise our issues of livelihoods, economic loss, displacement from our lands, alienation from natural resources, destruction of environment and threat to our biodiversity and cultural hotspots, where Bank invested in large, supposedly ‘development’ projects like mega dams, energy and other infrastructure projects. Yet, the outcome we expected rarely delivered sufficient remedy for the harm and losses people have experienced over the years.
A number of accountability mechanisms over the next couple of decades in several development finance institutions were formed following the model of World Bank, commonly known as ‘Independent Accountability Mechanisms’[IAMs]. Each year the number of complaints rise which is an indication of the increasing number of grievous projects happening around the world. While IAMs of most MDBs are advertised to provide strong and just processes, many of our experiences imply that the banks are accommodating practices which suit their own needs and their clients, which are borrowing countries and agencies, and not the people for whom the IAMs were built to serve.
Many a time, we have been disappointed by these mechanisms, since these are designed by the banks who are lending for disastrous projects in our lands. And as a result, the already existing narrow mandate of IAMs is further restricted.
In our efforts to hold the lending bank accountable, the communities are always presented with the arduous process of learning the complex formalities and detailed procedures to initially approach the IAMs and get our grievances registered. Our many years’ time and energy then is channelised into seeing through the various cycles of these complaint handling mechanisms, that our entire efforts go into this process, and often our complaint gets dropped off in midst of the procedural rules of the IAMs. People are made to wait many months to clear procedural levels and our cases with the IAMs get highly unpredictable. Further, we face intimidation and reprisals from the state and project agencies for having contacted the IAMs who themselves do not possess any authority to address the violations hurled out to us when we seek dignity, fair treatment and justice from them. There are many of us who feel a loss of morale after long years of struggling with lenders when we fail to see concrete benefits or changes in our circumstances, by which time considerable irreplaceable harm is already done to our lives, environment and livelihoods.
In this manner, our immediate and larger goal of holding banks for their failure to consult with and obtain consent from communities before devising action plans for our lands, water and forests is deflected in the pretext of problem-solving and grievance hearing offered to us in the name of IAMs.
With over 50 registered complaints sent to different IAMS from India in the past 25 years, many more left unregistered due to technical reasons and only a few got investigated, assessed and monitored at different levels, we have a baggage of mixed experiences with the IAMs. A few of the prominent cases from India apart from Narmada project are Vishnugad Pipalkoti Hydro Electric Project [WB’s IP], Tata Mega Ultra-01/Mundra and Anjar [IFC’s CAO & ADB’s CRP], India Infrastructure Fund-01/Dhenkanal District [IFC’s CAO], Allain Duhangan Hydro Power Limited-01/Himachal Pradesh [IFC’s CAO] and Mumbai Urban Transport Project (2009) [WB’s IP].
As we now know, what is being witnessed recently is an influx of approved and proposed investments majorly in energy, transport, steel, roads, urban projects, bullet trains, industrial zones/corridors, smart cities, water privatization and other mega projects in India. This has been financed from different multilateral and bilateral sources, foreign corporations, private banks as well as Export-Import Banks (ExIm Banks). It has become a brutal challenge for communities, social movements and CSOs, with lenders and governments constantly shutting their eyes and ears to us who demand accountability for their actions. A compelling and timely need has arisen among diverse groups amongst us to gather together and critically analyze the various trajectories of our engagements with accountability mechanisms of MDBs in order to bring together past 25 years’ learning, insights and reflections of various actors of this accountability process. This urging demand is also an attempt to define the collective experiences in India among our social movements, projected-affected communities and CSOs with IAMs and lending banks, especially appropriating the global political opportunity of Inspection Panel celebrating its 25 years this year.
Speakers:
Thomas Franco, Former General Secretary, AlI India Bank Officers’ Confederation
Arun Kumar, Eminent scholar, Former Professor Jawaharlal Nehru University
C.P. Chandrashekar, Economist, Professor Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Sucheta Dalal, Managing Editor, Moneylife
Soumya Dutta, National Convener, Bharat Jan Vigyan Jatha
Dunu Roy, Hazards Center, New Delhi
Medha Patkar, Senior Activist, Narmada Bachao Andolan
Tani Alex, Centre for Financial Accountability
M J Vijayan, Activist and Political commentator
Joe Athialy, Centre for Financial Accountability
Anirudha Nagar, Accountability Counsel
Madhuresh Kumar, National Alliance of People’s Movements
A J Vijayan, Chairperson, Western Ghats and Coastal area Protection Forum
Meera Sanghamitra, National Aliance of People’s Movements
Vimal bhai, Matu Jan Sangathan, Uttarakhand
Daniel Adler, Senior Specialist, Compliance Advisor Ombudsman
Joe Athialy, Centre for Financial Accountability
Birgit Kuba, Operations Officer, Inspection Panel
Anuradha Munshi, Centre for Financial Accountability
Bharat Patel, General Secretary, Machimar Adhikar Sangharsh Sangathan,Gujarat
Awadhesh Kumar, Srijan Lokhit Samiti
Amulya Kumar Nayak, Odisha Chas Parivesh Surekhsa Parishad, Odisha
Dr. Usha Ramanathan, Legal Scholar
Manshi Asher, Himdhara Environment Research and Action Collective, Himachal Pradesh
John Fleming, M.D.
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health Technology Reform
The Center For Total Health, Washington DC
May 24, 2017
The Council of Accountable Physician Practices (CAPP) and the American Cancer Society join forces to showcase how coverage and accountable healthcare systems can improve survival and reduce morbidity for people living with complex conditions like cancer. Better Together Health 2017 featured stories of medical excellence and patient-centered care delivered by CAPP’s organized systems and medical groups, plus an exciting policy keynote and panel discussion featuring national physician leaders, policymakers and patient voices.
The envisaged EU banking supervision rules must be of good quality and provide for accountability. However the member states' current preferences for establishing them risk sending the wrong message, as well as perpetuating inefficiencies, warned the Parliament in a resolution approved on Thursday.
The resolution comes a day after the Commission tabled two proposals to reinforce banking supervision. It sets out some of the key concerns that MEPs want to see addressed in decisions shaping the system.
The resolution also highlights certain points of substance which should be considered in the debate on how to enact banking supervision. An important one concerns bank recapitalisations, which, the resolution suggests, could be carried out by the European Stability Mechanism (ESM). A second is the need to devise a system which will be able to address any spillover effects on non-Eurozone members stemming from the creation of a Eurozone banking union.
www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?type=MOTION&re...
This photo is copyright free, but must be credited: "© European Union 2012 - European Parliament". (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs Creative Commons license). For HR files please contact: webcom-flickr(AT)europarl.europa.eu
The Inspection Panel is completing 25 years in its role, as an accountability mechanism of the World Bank. As you are aware, the Bank’s failure to comply with its operating policies was seen by the entire world in the Bank’s financing with the Sardar Sarovar Dam project on River Narmada. The tenacity of massive grass-roots uprisings from our communities in the 80’s and the sustained hard work of our social movements along with our resoluteness to link it with international coalitions to question the hegemony of the Bank, subsequently led the Bank, for the first time, to commission an independent review of its project. The Independent Review Committee (Morse Committee) constituted by the Bank in 1991 to review the social and environmental costs and benefits of the dam, after years of consistent struggle by Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save Narmada Movement) and its allies led to a demand from the civil society around the globe for the creation of a grievance redressal system for project-affected communities, which ultimately pressurized the Bank to constitute the Inspection Panel in 1993. We expected this might be a crucial backstop and an opportunity for us to raise our issues of livelihoods, economic loss, displacement from our lands, alienation from natural resources, destruction of environment and threat to our biodiversity and cultural hotspots, where Bank invested in large, supposedly ‘development’ projects like mega dams, energy and other infrastructure projects. Yet, the outcome we expected rarely delivered sufficient remedy for the harm and losses people have experienced over the years.
A number of accountability mechanisms over the next couple of decades in several development finance institutions were formed following the model of World Bank, commonly known as ‘Independent Accountability Mechanisms’[IAMs]. Each year the number of complaints rise which is an indication of the increasing number of grievous projects happening around the world. While IAMs of most MDBs are advertised to provide strong and just processes, many of our experiences imply that the banks are accommodating practices which suit their own needs and their clients, which are borrowing countries and agencies, and not the people for whom the IAMs were built to serve.
Many a time, we have been disappointed by these mechanisms, since these are designed by the banks who are lending for disastrous projects in our lands. And as a result, the already existing narrow mandate of IAMs is further restricted.
In our efforts to hold the lending bank accountable, the communities are always presented with the arduous process of learning the complex formalities and detailed procedures to initially approach the IAMs and get our grievances registered. Our many years’ time and energy then is channelised into seeing through the various cycles of these complaint handling mechanisms, that our entire efforts go into this process, and often our complaint gets dropped off in midst of the procedural rules of the IAMs. People are made to wait many months to clear procedural levels and our cases with the IAMs get highly unpredictable. Further, we face intimidation and reprisals from the state and project agencies for having contacted the IAMs who themselves do not possess any authority to address the violations hurled out to us when we seek dignity, fair treatment and justice from them. There are many of us who feel a loss of morale after long years of struggling with lenders when we fail to see concrete benefits or changes in our circumstances, by which time considerable irreplaceable harm is already done to our lives, environment and livelihoods.
In this manner, our immediate and larger goal of holding banks for their failure to consult with and obtain consent from communities before devising action plans for our lands, water and forests is deflected in the pretext of problem-solving and grievance hearing offered to us in the name of IAMs.
With over 50 registered complaints sent to different IAMS from India in the past 25 years, many more left unregistered due to technical reasons and only a few got investigated, assessed and monitored at different levels, we have a baggage of mixed experiences with the IAMs. A few of the prominent cases from India apart from Narmada project are Vishnugad Pipalkoti Hydro Electric Project [WB’s IP], Tata Mega Ultra-01/Mundra and Anjar [IFC’s CAO & ADB’s CRP], India Infrastructure Fund-01/Dhenkanal District [IFC’s CAO], Allain Duhangan Hydro Power Limited-01/Himachal Pradesh [IFC’s CAO] and Mumbai Urban Transport Project (2009) [WB’s IP].
As we now know, what is being witnessed recently is an influx of approved and proposed investments majorly in energy, transport, steel, roads, urban projects, bullet trains, industrial zones/corridors, smart cities, water privatization and other mega projects in India. This has been financed from different multilateral and bilateral sources, foreign corporations, private banks as well as Export-Import Banks (ExIm Banks). It has become a brutal challenge for communities, social movements and CSOs, with lenders and governments constantly shutting their eyes and ears to us who demand accountability for their actions. A compelling and timely need has arisen among diverse groups amongst us to gather together and critically analyze the various trajectories of our engagements with accountability mechanisms of MDBs in order to bring together past 25 years’ learning, insights and reflections of various actors of this accountability process. This urging demand is also an attempt to define the collective experiences in India among our social movements, projected-affected communities and CSOs with IAMs and lending banks, especially appropriating the global political opportunity of Inspection Panel celebrating its 25 years this year.
Speakers:
Thomas Franco, Former General Secretary, AlI India Bank Officers’ Confederation
Arun Kumar, Eminent scholar, Former Professor Jawaharlal Nehru University
C.P. Chandrashekar, Economist, Professor Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Sucheta Dalal, Managing Editor, Moneylife
Soumya Dutta, National Convener, Bharat Jan Vigyan Jatha
Dunu Roy, Hazards Center, New Delhi
Medha Patkar, Senior Activist, Narmada Bachao Andolan
Tani Alex, Centre for Financial Accountability
M J Vijayan, Activist and Political commentator
Joe Athialy, Centre for Financial Accountability
Anirudha Nagar, Accountability Counsel
Madhuresh Kumar, National Alliance of People’s Movements
A J Vijayan, Chairperson, Western Ghats and Coastal area Protection Forum
Meera Sanghamitra, National Aliance of People’s Movements
Vimal bhai, Matu Jan Sangathan, Uttarakhand
Daniel Adler, Senior Specialist, Compliance Advisor Ombudsman
Joe Athialy, Centre for Financial Accountability
Birgit Kuba, Operations Officer, Inspection Panel
Anuradha Munshi, Centre for Financial Accountability
Bharat Patel, General Secretary, Machimar Adhikar Sangharsh Sangathan,Gujarat
Awadhesh Kumar, Srijan Lokhit Samiti
Amulya Kumar Nayak, Odisha Chas Parivesh Surekhsa Parishad, Odisha
Dr. Usha Ramanathan, Legal Scholar
Manshi Asher, Himdhara Environment Research and Action Collective, Himachal Pradesh
Dokhi Fassihian, executive director of Reporters Without Borders USA, highlights the lack of accountability for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, saying, "Murderers do not deserve the protection of the government."
On Tuesday, March 3, Sen. Wyden (D-OR), Rep. Tom Malinowski (D-NJ), and fiancée of the late Jamal Khashoggi, Hatice Cengiz, hosted a press conference to discuss the administration’s refusal to publicly release details on the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi and to announce next steps for securing transparency and accountability for his murder.
Co-sponsors:
– Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain
– Committee to Protect Journalists
– Human Rights First
– James W. Foley Legacy Foundation
– PEN America
– Project on Middle East Democracy
– Reporters Without Borders
Tuesday, March 3, 2020
10:00 am – 11:00 am
Dirksen Senate Office Building, Room 215
50 Constitution Ave NE, Washington, DC 20510
Photo credit: April Brady/Project on Middle East Democracy
Better accountability, transparency and more detailed targets for climate action will be mandated under a new Climate Change Accountability Act.
Learn more: news.gov.bc.ca/20903
Current weight: 148
I started going to the gym this past weekend. I've done water aerobics, started working with a trainer, and have tried to eat better.
I hope that I'm able to get results.
This image is excerpted from a U.S. GAO report:
www.gao.gov/products/GAO-23-105611
Software Acquisition: Additional Actions Needed to Help DOD Implement Future Modernization Efforts
Kiribati: Access and mobility for people with disabilities is already challenging in the Pacific, but it's even harder during disasters and the chaotic aftermath. UNFPA has been able to contribute to the disater plans for countries like Kiribati by preparing kits that are adapted to the needs of people with disabilities.
@UNFPA/Carly Learson
John Ellis of The Pittsburgh Foundation attends the symposium about the role of universities in supporting local accountability journalism. Photo by Molly J. Smith.
Miatta Mulbah is currently an accountapreneur with the Accountability Lab. In Liberia, many young girls engage in commercial sex in order to survive or to pay for school. Miatta’s vision is “a Liberia where teenage girls are not exposed or forced into harmful practices that endanger their health or their future.” Through her organization Leemah, Miatta is using music and street theater to advocate for and raise awareness among girls in Montserrado and Margibi counties, ages 11-25, who face challenges of sexual violence, abuse, poverty. Leemah strives to change the mindsets vulnerable Liberian girls, and the broader community, to understand their rights and responsibilities as citizens and to rethink their future.
Better accountability, transparency and more detailed targets for climate action will be mandated under a new Climate Change Accountability Act.
Learn more: news.gov.bc.ca/20903
The Future Generation Bill and The Sustainabe Development Bill - Wales.
Long term Perspective Needed
The World Futures Council has been working to promote and develop these structures at all levels of governance over the past 3 years. The function can be interpreted in different ways but essentially has the mandate to:
• Balance short term interests of political institutions with long term interests of society
• Take responsibility for making sure sustainability policies work in synergy and are effective in practice
• Bring authority to agreed sustainable development goals - holding governments and the private sector to account
• Provide space to share and inform others of analytical evidence and research
• Facilitate coherence between separate pillars of Government
• Connect citizens and civil society with the core of policymaking
There were six criteria defined as being essential in achieving a successful impact – being independent, proficient (in respect of capacity of multidisciplinary staff), transparent, legitimate (in terms of establishment within the democratic system), having full access to all relevant information, and being widely accessible to citizen concerns. www.cynnalcymru.com/blog/long-term-perspective-needed
World Future Council
Twitter: @Good_Policies
The World Future Council (WFC) consists of 50 respected personalities from all five continents. They represent governments, parliaments, the arts, civil society, academia and the business world. Together they form a voice for the rights of future generations. The World Future Council is a charitable foundation reliant on donations. www.worldfuturecouncil.org/about_us.html
World Futures Council - Twitter: @FutureJustice0
Decisions taken by politicians today will have a major influence on the world of tomorrow. www.futurejustice.org/about-us/
' Holding governments and the private sector to account '
Future Generations Bill: Better Choices for a Better Future
wales.gov.uk/topics/sustainabledevelopment/sdbill/?lang=en
Welsh sustainability law to be introduced in 2014 www.resource.uk.com/article/Waste_Law/Welsh_sustainabilit...
Twitter @nspugh twitter.com/nspugh
Mayor Bill de Blasio signs an NYPD accountability package, a comprehensive set of reforms including Intros 487-A, 536-B, 721-B, 760-B, 1309-B, 1962-A, after helping paint the new Black Lives Matter mural in the Bronx. Morris Avenue between 161st and 162nd Street, Bronx. Wednesday, July 15, 2020. Credit: Ed Reed/Mayoral Photography Office.
This photograph is provided by the New York City Mayoral Photography Office (MPO) for the benefit of the general public and for dissemination by members of the media. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way and may not be used in commercial materials, advertisements, emails, products or promotions that in any way suggests approval or endorsement of the City of New York, the Mayoral administration, or the de Blasio family without prior consent from the MPO (PhotoOffice@cityhall.nyc.gov). Any use or reprinting of official MPO photographs must use the following credit language and style: “Photographer/Mayoral Photography Office”, as listed at the end of each caption.
The Center For Total Health, Washington DC
May 24, 2017
The Council of Accountable Physician Practices (CAPP) and the American Cancer Society join forces to showcase how coverage and accountable healthcare systems can improve survival and reduce morbidity for people living with complex conditions like cancer. Better Together Health 2017 featured stories of medical excellence and patient-centered care delivered by CAPP’s organized systems and medical groups, plus an exciting policy keynote and panel discussion featuring national physician leaders, policymakers and patient voices.
The Center For Total Health, Washington DC
May 24, 2017
The Council of Accountable Physician Practices (CAPP) and the American Cancer Society join forces to showcase how coverage and accountable healthcare systems can improve survival and reduce morbidity for people living with complex conditions like cancer. Better Together Health 2017 featured stories of medical excellence and patient-centered care delivered by CAPP’s organized systems and medical groups, plus an exciting policy keynote and panel discussion featuring national physician leaders, policymakers and patient voices.
Accountability Windmill 25-Pack Greeting Cards: Discover the impact of our cards! These greeting cards add beautiful imagery and motivational messages to your notes and will make a positive impression on everyone who receives them. Stock cards are blank inside for a personal message and packaged flat to imprint messages using your computer printer. Includes 25 envelopes.
DISCHARGE OF OIL PROHIBITED -- THE FEDERAL WATER POLLUTION CONTROL ACT PROHIBITS THE DISCHARGE OF OIL OR OILY WASTE INTO OR UPON THE NAVIGABLE WATERS OF THE UNITED STATES, OR THE WATERS OF THE CONTIGUOUS ZONE, OR WHICH MAY AFFECT NATURAL RESOURCES BELONGING TO, APPERTAINING TO, OR UNDER THE EXCLUSIVE MANAGEMENT AUTHORITY OF THE UNITED STATES, IF SUCH DISCHARGE CAUSES A FILM OR DISCOLORATION OF THE SURFACE OF THE WATER OR CAUSES A SLUDGE OR EMULSION BENEATH THE SURFACE OF THE WATER. VIOLATORS ARE SUBJECT TO SUBSTANTIAL CIVIL PENALTIES AND/OR CRIMINAL SANCTIONS INCLUDING FINES AND IMPRISONMENT.
The Center For Total Health, Washington DC
May 24, 2017
The Council of Accountable Physician Practices (CAPP) and the American Cancer Society join forces to showcase how coverage and accountable healthcare systems can improve survival and reduce morbidity for people living with complex conditions like cancer. Better Together Health 2017 featured stories of medical excellence and patient-centered care delivered by CAPP’s organized systems and medical groups, plus an exciting policy keynote and panel discussion featuring national physician leaders, policymakers and patient voices.
Better accountability, transparency and more detailed targets for climate action will be mandated under a new Climate Change Accountability Act.
Learn more: news.gov.bc.ca/20903
One of our employees, Trevor Corbin, drew this to describe what NOT to do when choosing an accountability partner.
Read the post on the
So I am just putting this here because I obviously need to put on my big girl panties and be accountable for actions, or maybe more accurately my inactions?
I have several projects that I have started and not finished, and they really need to be finished. I hate craft guilt.
So I am laying all out here for every one to read maybe it will give me a boot in the ass and get me working on things that I have been outting off.
* #1 on my list: I REALLY really need to finish up the blocks for my very patient bee block partners. I am disgustingly over do especially considering that my month was the 1st month and they all got theirs to me in a timely fashion.
*Harry Potter Swap that I am doing with one of my best buddies Jeni! (this is pretty lax though)
*Finish up this ukulele bag. Just need to attach the back and bind the edges.
*Get this queen size quilt quilted and bound for my awesome friend Carrie.
*finish up this nightmare Galaga quilt for my husband that has been sitting in the naughty pile for over a year now.
So there you have it. Not a very big list but they are pretty big projects, I think.
Time to buckle down and get it done, Amanda!! ok done now. :)
Better accountability, transparency and more detailed targets for climate action will be mandated under a new Climate Change Accountability Act.
Learn more: news.gov.bc.ca/20903
After giving a very insightful lecture on information management and the US occupation of Iraq, Mark Bernstein holds up the iPhone while answering a question about the kinds of government accountability that result from widely-available cameras.
2022-10-06: Dieudonne Boenga, Private Sector Development, and Job Creation Support Project, DRC interacts with the officials during the CSO forum.
2020-12-15: Carina Sugden, Chief Governance Officer, African Development Bank Group; Maisie Nkau, CEO, Supreme Audit Institution, SA; Barbara Rwodzi, CEO, House of BarRue Knitwear; Adriano Nuvunga, Director Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) and Rabah Arezki, Chief Economist for Middle East and North Africa Region (MNA), World Bank during Promoting Accountability and Transparency during COVID-19, 2020.
* What Would Accountability Wednesday Do?
Accountability Wednesday doesn't care that my thighs are sore because that means I am out of shape.
Accountability Wednesday doesn't care that I ran yesterday, because if I'm going out of town this weekend, I have to go the gym today.
Accountability Wednesday doesn't care that I have Pilates class tomorrow, because tomorrow is not today.
Accountability Wednesday is a bitch, but she has my best interests at heart.
The Inspection Panel is completing 25 years in its role, as an accountability mechanism of the World Bank. As you are aware, the Bank’s failure to comply with its operating policies was seen by the entire world in the Bank’s financing with the Sardar Sarovar Dam project on River Narmada. The tenacity of massive grass-roots uprisings from our communities in the 80’s and the sustained hard work of our social movements along with our resoluteness to link it with international coalitions to question the hegemony of the Bank, subsequently led the Bank, for the first time, to commission an independent review of its project. The Independent Review Committee (Morse Committee) constituted by the Bank in 1991 to review the social and environmental costs and benefits of the dam, after years of consistent struggle by Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save Narmada Movement) and its allies led to a demand from the civil society around the globe for the creation of a grievance redressal system for project-affected communities, which ultimately pressurized the Bank to constitute the Inspection Panel in 1993. We expected this might be a crucial backstop and an opportunity for us to raise our issues of livelihoods, economic loss, displacement from our lands, alienation from natural resources, destruction of environment and threat to our biodiversity and cultural hotspots, where Bank invested in large, supposedly ‘development’ projects like mega dams, energy and other infrastructure projects. Yet, the outcome we expected rarely delivered sufficient remedy for the harm and losses people have experienced over the years.
A number of accountability mechanisms over the next couple of decades in several development finance institutions were formed following the model of World Bank, commonly known as ‘Independent Accountability Mechanisms’[IAMs]. Each year the number of complaints rise which is an indication of the increasing number of grievous projects happening around the world. While IAMs of most MDBs are advertised to provide strong and just processes, many of our experiences imply that the banks are accommodating practices which suit their own needs and their clients, which are borrowing countries and agencies, and not the people for whom the IAMs were built to serve.
Many a time, we have been disappointed by these mechanisms, since these are designed by the banks who are lending for disastrous projects in our lands. And as a result, the already existing narrow mandate of IAMs is further restricted.
In our efforts to hold the lending bank accountable, the communities are always presented with the arduous process of learning the complex formalities and detailed procedures to initially approach the IAMs and get our grievances registered. Our many years’ time and energy then is channelised into seeing through the various cycles of these complaint handling mechanisms, that our entire efforts go into this process, and often our complaint gets dropped off in midst of the procedural rules of the IAMs. People are made to wait many months to clear procedural levels and our cases with the IAMs get highly unpredictable. Further, we face intimidation and reprisals from the state and project agencies for having contacted the IAMs who themselves do not possess any authority to address the violations hurled out to us when we seek dignity, fair treatment and justice from them. There are many of us who feel a loss of morale after long years of struggling with lenders when we fail to see concrete benefits or changes in our circumstances, by which time considerable irreplaceable harm is already done to our lives, environment and livelihoods.
In this manner, our immediate and larger goal of holding banks for their failure to consult with and obtain consent from communities before devising action plans for our lands, water and forests is deflected in the pretext of problem-solving and grievance hearing offered to us in the name of IAMs.
With over 50 registered complaints sent to different IAMS from India in the past 25 years, many more left unregistered due to technical reasons and only a few got investigated, assessed and monitored at different levels, we have a baggage of mixed experiences with the IAMs. A few of the prominent cases from India apart from Narmada project are Vishnugad Pipalkoti Hydro Electric Project [WB’s IP], Tata Mega Ultra-01/Mundra and Anjar [IFC’s CAO & ADB’s CRP], India Infrastructure Fund-01/Dhenkanal District [IFC’s CAO], Allain Duhangan Hydro Power Limited-01/Himachal Pradesh [IFC’s CAO] and Mumbai Urban Transport Project (2009) [WB’s IP].
As we now know, what is being witnessed recently is an influx of approved and proposed investments majorly in energy, transport, steel, roads, urban projects, bullet trains, industrial zones/corridors, smart cities, water privatization and other mega projects in India. This has been financed from different multilateral and bilateral sources, foreign corporations, private banks as well as Export-Import Banks (ExIm Banks). It has become a brutal challenge for communities, social movements and CSOs, with lenders and governments constantly shutting their eyes and ears to us who demand accountability for their actions. A compelling and timely need has arisen among diverse groups amongst us to gather together and critically analyze the various trajectories of our engagements with accountability mechanisms of MDBs in order to bring together past 25 years’ learning, insights and reflections of various actors of this accountability process. This urging demand is also an attempt to define the collective experiences in India among our social movements, projected-affected communities and CSOs with IAMs and lending banks, especially appropriating the global political opportunity of Inspection Panel celebrating its 25 years this year.
Speakers:
Thomas Franco, Former General Secretary, AlI India Bank Officers’ Confederation
Arun Kumar, Eminent scholar, Former Professor Jawaharlal Nehru University
C.P. Chandrashekar, Economist, Professor Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Sucheta Dalal, Managing Editor, Moneylife
Soumya Dutta, National Convener, Bharat Jan Vigyan Jatha
Dunu Roy, Hazards Center, New Delhi
Medha Patkar, Senior Activist, Narmada Bachao Andolan
Tani Alex, Centre for Financial Accountability
M J Vijayan, Activist and Political commentator
Joe Athialy, Centre for Financial Accountability
Anirudha Nagar, Accountability Counsel
Madhuresh Kumar, National Alliance of People’s Movements
A J Vijayan, Chairperson, Western Ghats and Coastal area Protection Forum
Meera Sanghamitra, National Aliance of People’s Movements
Vimal bhai, Matu Jan Sangathan, Uttarakhand
Daniel Adler, Senior Specialist, Compliance Advisor Ombudsman
Joe Athialy, Centre for Financial Accountability
Birgit Kuba, Operations Officer, Inspection Panel
Anuradha Munshi, Centre for Financial Accountability
Bharat Patel, General Secretary, Machimar Adhikar Sangharsh Sangathan,Gujarat
Awadhesh Kumar, Srijan Lokhit Samiti
Amulya Kumar Nayak, Odisha Chas Parivesh Surekhsa Parishad, Odisha
Dr. Usha Ramanathan, Legal Scholar
Manshi Asher, Himdhara Environment Research and Action Collective, Himachal Pradesh
Accountable Care Organizations and Competition Policy
January 24, 2011, 12:00pm -1:30pm
To view a video of this event, click here: http://www.americanprogress.org//events/2011/01/aco.html
The Affordable Care Act provides an opportunity to create integrated, cost effective, high quality health care systems for Medicare recipients—and eventually all Americans—through the creation of Accountable Care Organizations, or ACOs. One of the most challenging questions facing ACOs is how to provide integration without sacrificing competition and the decreased cost and increased quality it produces. The Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the Federal Trade Commission, and the Department of Justice have already been carefully scrutinizing these issues. Will some ACOs threaten competition and eventually raise costs for consumers? To what extent can ACOs overcome the barriers set up by current antitrust regulation? How should the lessons from health care reform educate the role of antitrust enforcement and regulation? How should we approach health care antitrust issues in an era of ACOs?
We were joined for a discussion of these and other questions related to implementing the Accountable Care Act in a way that enhances competition, provides better care, and lowers costs.