Campaigning on the unfinished business of Jubilee 2000 did not cease at the end of last year. The baton has been well and truly passed on, with the launch of the Jubilee Debt Campaign (JDC) on 24 March.

DC is a coalition of the UK supporter organisations (national and regional) who played such a critical role in delivering the successes of Jubilee 2000. It encompasses NGOs such as Christian Aid, Oxfam, Tearfund and Cafod, and also energetic grassroots supporter groups, including London Jubilee (which I am very involved with and had its roots in a London Diocesan group formed by Rev Chris Brice).

The first major project of JDC is to support the Drop the Debt project that is working to secure a New Deal on debt at the G7 Summit in Genoa, 20-22 July. The aim is to secure 100% debt cancellation from the multilateral lenders (the IMF and the World Bank), to match the 100% bilateral debt cancellation already agreed by most G7 governments, including our own.

Uganda Dept Network and Christian Aid Week
In order to qualify for debt relief, the government of Uganda had to tackle the problem of corruption. A Poverty Action Fund has ensured that funds released from debt relief can be monitored by civil society. The Uganda Debt Network (IJDN), an advocacy and lobbying organisation, was started in 1998 to help pursue this monumental challenge. It is a Christian Aid partner and in March they brought Christine Nantongo, head of communications, to England.

Those of us who heard Christine speak were truly humbled. She is energetic, positive, and a real beacon of light. She showed a wonderful film of the Uganda Debt Network using artwork and street drama productions to teach awareness of corruption at all levels of society. Illiteracy does not prevent ordinary people understanding the issues. The workers and volunteers in the UDN wear T-shirts and baseball caps bearing the slogan Ugandans Against Corruption as they travel round the country. Having focused on adults in the past two years, the UDN has now started a lot of work in schools.

Uganda is the first of the highly indebted poor countries to have received debt cancellation and their debt burden has been reduced by about 42%. Universal primary education was already planned before debt relief came along, but Christine gave some heartening statistics on how debt relief has enhanced the programme: 3600 classrooms completed, 7 more primary teacher training colleges, student to teacher ratio reduced from 1-200 to 1-80, all of this benefiting about 6 million children.

In addition, there is the less obvious benefit of empowerment. Jubilee 2000 is perceived as a campaign led by people in the North. Many people in the developing world have of course been working tirelessly on social justice issues, including debt, over many years, without any high profile. Christine very kindly said that Jubilee 2000 has helped Ugandans to occupy political space and to establish relations with other African countries and with the North.

With those words and knowledge that the Uganda Debt Network has a 10-year plan, how can we give up debt campaigning just because the year 2000 has ended?

Source: Ann Peterken, The Spire Magazine - 2001 May