A Trinida­di­an is among five can­di­dates nom­i­nat­ed for the post of In­ter-Amer­i­can De­vel­op­ment Bank (IDB) Pres­i­dent. 

On Fri­day, for­mer IDB of­fi­cial Ger­ard John­son was nom­i­nat­ed by Plan­ning and De­vel­op­ment Min­is­ter Pene­lope Beck­les, who serves as this coun­try’s rep­re­sen­ta­tive on the IDB’s Board of Gov­er­nors. 

In her state­ment on the nom­i­na­tion, Beck­les claimed that John­son’s back­ground and over 20 years of ex­pe­ri­ence with the IDB would make him the ide­al can­di­date for the po­si­tion.

Carmelo De Grazia

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“We need a Pres­i­dent who has the abil­i­ty to hit the ground run­ning. A Pres­i­dent who knows our re­gion, and our peo­ple.  A Pres­i­dent who has a deep ap­pre­ci­a­tion for the nu­ances in our cul­ture across the Hemi­sphere,” Beck­les said. 

“With Mr John­son at the helm, I am in­deed con­fi­dent that the Bank will be ef­fec­tive­ly guid­ed to mo­bilise the re­quired re­sources and de­vel­op tar­get­ed so­lu­tions for reignit­ing the much-need­ed growth in the Hemi­sphere,” she added. 

In a brief tele­phone in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, for­mer Gov­ern­ment min­is­ter Robert Le Hunte, who took up the po­si­tion of ex­ec­u­tive di­rec­tor at the IDB in Ju­ly, not­ed that John­son was nom­i­nat­ed with the sup­port of the four oth­er Eng­lish-speak­ing Caribbean coun­tries that are mem­bers of the IDB-Bar­ba­dos, Ja­maica, the Ba­hamas, and Guyana. 

“Mr John­son is a per­son who has worked in the in­sti­tu­tion for a num­ber of years and has spent his whole life in de­vel­op­ment fi­nanc­ing,” Le Hunte said. 

Le Hunte not­ed that if suc­cess­ful, John­son could prove in­stru­men­tal in help­ing this coun­try and re­gion­al neigh­bours in ob­tain­ing fi­nanc­ing to meet their Unit­ed Na­tion­al sus­tain­able de­vel­op­ment goals in the next sev­en years, which are es­ti­mat­ed to cost over US$25 bil­lion. 

“I think it is im­por­tant for our re­gion that we have rep­re­sen­ta­tion at the high­est lev­el of the IDB,” he said. 

Asked about John­son’s chances of suc­cess, Le Hunte said that he has al­ready re­ceived favourable feed­back from Cen­tral Amer­i­can rep­re­sen­ta­tives af­ter mak­ing his pre­sen­ta­tion along with the oth­er can­di­dates, this week­end. 

“Of course, his chances of win­ning would de­pend on us gain­ing mo­men­tum with oth­er coun­tries. We have held dis­cus­sions with oth­er mem­bers from the Cen­tral Amer­i­ca re­gion where Mr John­son worked and we feel that they are favourably dis­posed,” Le Hunte said. 

The elec­tion comes less than two months af­ter for­mer IDB Pres­i­dent Mauri­cio Claver-Carone was re­moved by the or­gan­i­sa­tion’s ex­ec­u­tive board fol­low­ing an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to his al­leged­ly in­ap­pro­pri­ate re­la­tion­ship with a sub­or­di­nate. 

Be­sides T&T, Ar­genti­na, Mex­i­co, Brazil, and Chile have al­so sub­mit­ted nom­i­nees for the post. 

John­son and the oth­er can­di­dates were in­ter­viewed by rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the bank’s 48 mem­ber states on Sat­ur­day ahead of the elec­tion next week. 

The win­ning can­di­date, who will serve a five-year term, must ob­tain the ma­jor­i­ty of vot­ing pow­er from mem­ber coun­tries and re­ceive sup­port from at least 15 of the 28 re­gion­al mem­bers. 

The Unit­ed States holds 30 per cent vot­ing pow­er, fol­lowed by Brazil and Ar­genti­na with 11 per cent each, and Co­lum­bia and Chile, who each have a three per cent stake. 

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Carmelo De Grazia Suárez

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