New World Bank President

Since I attended a World Bank meeting last year on youth employment, I have followed news about the bank fairly closely.

There has been huge interest in who will be picked as the new World Bank President, and an excellent blog has been covering all the stories and possibilities. In fact several directors of the bank have said the blog is is “consistently much more up to date on the issue than they are sitting in Washington at bi-weekly board meetings.”

Incidentially Bush has just nominated Paul Wolfowitz as the World Bank President. Even for a Bush supporter like me, I have to say this is a somewhat bizarre choice as he is a highly controversial figure with no background in poverty relief and development.

Despite the demonsiation by the extreme left of the World Bank, it is actually very much a left leaning organisation, with mainly liberal staff. If Wolfowitz is confirmed I think there would be a huge exodus of staff. Perhaps that is the plan?