This post is also available in: Arabic
For the first time in Inspection Panel history, an Eligibility Report is being held for board discussion. With little information, we are left wondering what is happening with the investigation into the Yemeni DPL case.
Members of the World Bank’s Inspection Panel visited Yemen last June to meet with Yemeni civil society organizations and prepare an Eligibility Report for the case that was submitted to the Inspection Panel earlier by the Yemen Observatory for Human Rights (YOHR). YOHR’s complaint was based around the World Bank’s repeated refusal to translate into Arabic a Development Policy Loan (DPL) titled “Institutional Reform Program in Yemen” that was approved in December 2007. This key program is financed by the International Development Association (IDA) of the World Bank and will have repercussions on practically all aspects of socio-economic life in Yemen.
As a result of filing this complaint, YOHR finally received the translation of the DPL, but the organization insisted on going forward with its complaint maintaining that there are black-out policies and a severe lack of information associated with the “Institutional Reform Program in Yemen”. It was in this context that the Inspection Panel made their trip to Yemen, and issues of transparency, translation and consultation during the preparation of the DPL were all raised at the meeting.
Upon their return to Washington, D.C., the Inspection Panel members prepared their Eligibility Report and submitted it to the World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors on June 18th. This report included the Inspection Panel’s recommendation on whether or not YOHR’s claims should be investigated. The Board then had to approve the recommendation on a non-objection basis. According to Inspection Panel procedures, this report is not disclosed to the public, including the requesters, until the no-objection period given to the Board ends. With the Yemen case, this period was expected to end on July 2nd. When the report was not disclosed at the end of this period, YOHR inquired about the report, only to be told by the Inspection Panel that the Board had decided to hold on to the report and to call a Board meeting to discuss it. This meeting, we have now learnt, is scheduled for September 15th.
This is the first incident of its sort in the Inspection Panel’s 16-year history. Out of the 58 cases that the Inspection Panel has received to date, only four recommendations for investigation were not approved by the Board, but the Board has never asked to hold a meeting to discuss an Eligibility Report with the Panel. This unique event leaves us wondering what was in the Eligibility Report and why this case has caused such a reaction from the Board. Moreover, will the meeting’s discussion be limited to the Yemen case or will it go beyond that to discuss the broader scope of the Inspection Panel’s work? For now we can only sit and wait.