Selection of Korean-born Jim Yong Kim draws criticism from other candidates over alleged US dominance of powerful post. The World Bank has named a Korean-American medical doctor, Jim Yong Kim, as its next president, despite criticism of the selection process by his rivals for the job.
While the US nominee faced a challenge for the first time ever, the World Bank's most powerful shareholders, the US, Europe and Japan, came out in support on Monday for Kim who now holds the powerful job of providing loans and grants to developing countries. Before the meeting of World Bank directors, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Nigeria's finance minister and a veteran of the institution who had also been nominated as a candidate, criticised the way the US had dominated the appointment process since the organisation was launched in 1944.
Al Jazeera's Alan Fisher, reporting from Washington, DC, said there was some dissent from member states over Kim's qualifications. "He's not an economist, but then again, now is the time that people say the World Bank needs to look at other issues such as climate change, food supply, water [scarcity] and diseases like bird flu," our correspondent said, pointing out that Kim has significant experience in developing countries. "Even so, there is a growing feeling that the process needs to be opened up, so that the US doesn't always get the post."