Declaration of Jubilee South/Americas, on occasion of the 5th. Ministerial Meeting of the OMC, Cancún No to Free Trade! No to the External Debt!
Yes to LIFE and Popular Sovereignty! On the occasion of the 5th Ministerial Meeting of the WTO, in Cancún, México, September 10-14, 2003, Jubilee South/Americas is among the activists, militants from around the world and in particular, from the South of the world (Africa, Asia, the Pacific, Latin America, the Caribbean), who are demonstrating their rejection of the mercantilization of all spheres of life which is at stake in the debates to be held over these days. It is our impression that what we are confronting is a clear integration of the World Bank, Interamerican Development Bank, and IMF's policies of structural adjustment, together with the talks in the WTO and other trade negotiations such as the FTAA, with a view to achieving a harmonization of the domestic and international economic policies of our countries, in particular their financial and commercial policies, in neoliberal terms. These policies are increasingly directed towards the opening of our national economies to foreign investment while at the same time, guaranteeing the faithful and continuous payment of external and internal debts. Our countries are being tied up hand and foot, in order to maintain finances –rather than production- as the central axis of the economy. With our finances anchored in monies such as the dollar or the euro, national projects of sovereign development, and the policies capable of insuring their implementation, are impossible. The future of our countries is also being tied up by policies of "preventive war", the imposition of U.S. military bases and exercises, and the criminalization of social protest. Liberal ideology preaches that free commerce leads to economic growth. Recent history has shown, however, that free trade among unequals favors the already developed economies, generating even greater impoverishment, inequality and injustice. The unquestionable dogma of paying the External Debt is contrary to the human rights and sovereignty of persons and of peoples. The IMF and its policies of (dis)adjustment have provoked true neocolonial invasions, as in the cases of Argentina, Ecuador, and Brazil. Our countries cannot subject themselves to agreements with the IMF which tell our governments what they can and cannot spend on job-creation policies and other social measures. The External Debt constitutes a veto and constant strangulation of the soveriegn socioeconomic development of the nations of the South. Over the past two centuries, our economies have come to depend on the foreign currency which comes from exports. Our countries have now moved from being exporters of bananas, meat, sugar, steel, copper, soybeans, petroleum, etc., to being exporters of money. We pay the debts, we pay the transfer of profits from the public enterprises that have been privatized, we pay the dividends to those who "invest" in the financial markets of Sao Paulo, Buenos Aires, Caracas, etc. In reality, it is the IMF, the World Bank, the Interamerican Development Bank, and the governments and transnational corporations of the North that have an immense social and ecological debt to the countries and peoples of the South – a debt which will only continue to rise with the free trade policies being demanded by the WTO and the FTAA. We demand an end to the pillage of the natural and financial resources of the South by the North. We demand that these multilateral institutions, governments and corporations be sanctioned for their actions, that the resources be restituted and reparations made to those who have suffered the damages. Enough of this bloodsucking! For Sovereignty, Jobs, Housing, and Agrarian Reform! No to the Debt, to Militarization, to the FTAA and WTO! Yes to Life! September 9, 2003 Jubilee South / Americas