Sudan is a long way from Boston, and events occurring in such a faraway part of the globe can feel like they’re happening on another planet. The people appearing on the news look different than us, speak an unintelligible language and live in ways hardly imaginable. Aspects of life are much different in Sudan, but I can’t help returning to a fundamental belief — that there should be no difference in the value of human life. Thus, because of the ongoing genocide in Darfur and Boston University’s lack of action in response to it, I think it’s time BU students force the school to act. First, administrators should disclose all university investments in Sudan. Then, the university should divest from irresponsible companies doing business in the county. It’s a simple two word mantra: disclose and divest.
Divestment campaigns have been sweeping the nation and BU is lagging far behind. The states of New Jersey, Oregon and Illinois have already passed divestment legislation. Socially responsible institutions such as Amherst, Brown, Dartmouth, Harvard, Stanford, the University of California and Yale have already sold shares of international companies working in Sudan, companies they consider to be supporting — directly or indirectly — the genocide. Across the river, students have forced the Harvard Corporation to divest from two Chinese petroleum companies. Even Harvard’s sometimes tongue-tied president, Lawrence Summers, has stated that divestment is the “right thing to do,” according to a Harvard press release.
The model BU ought to follow is the one set by the University of California system. It took an unprecedented step last month when it agreed to divest from nine companies doing business in Sudan, which work primarily in the oil and energy sectors and are based mainly in China, Russia, India and Malaysia.
With the help of financial advisers, the university weighed the adverse effects caused by a company’s dealings with the Sudanese government against the benefits the company might provide to the people of Sudan. Divestment was more likely for companies that provided revenue directly to the government, and was encouraged for any company that provided arms or military equipment to the government or militias. According to a divestment report provided to the regents of the university, the nine companies were “clearly shown to be providing monetary or military support to the government, while showing little or no interest in the situation in Darfur or in helping to improve the welfare of the Sudanese people.”
One of the biggest worries preventing many people from supporting divestment campaigns is the belief that by taking money out of the country, the Sudanese people will be hurt. This isn’t true; besides the University of California, other universities have established rigorous divestment criteria to ensure it’s in the best interests of the Sudanese people. Targeted companies were chosen because their policies lead to “substantial social injury,” as a statement by Stanford University argued, or were believed to be “[providing] the government of Sudan with substantial financial resources and the infrastructure to continue the sponsorship of genocidal actions in Darfur,” as Amherst stated in a press release.
The UC divestment campaign also admirably made exceptions for companies that were “engaged solely in the provision of goods and services intended to relieve human suffering or to promote welfare, health, religious and spiritual activities, and education for humanitarian purposes or otherwise. These goods and services specifically include agricultural commodities, medicine and medical devices.” And while I’m typically not a big fan of economists, the Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz was right in pointing out that the divested companies haven’t helped the Sudanese people. “In this case, I see little or no benefit to investment; but I do see enormous costs,” he said in the Amherst press release.
Maybe you’re like me — a bit of a skeptic — and question exactly how certain we can be that companies are “complacent” or “supporting” genocide. While I’m already alarmed by the potential conflict of interest that comes from running a company in Sudan and selling arms to the Sudanese government (as in the cases of China and Russia), I found more damning evidence in the San Francisco Chronicle. In a March 17 article on the UC’s plans to divest from Sudan Telecom Co. Ltd. (Sudatel), the paper quotes an ex-Marine and former representative to the African Union peacekeeping mission in 2004-05, Brian Steidle. Steidle claims that during his time in Sudan, “Sudatel routinely turned off phone service to villages in Darfur shortly before those settlements were attacked.”
If that doesn’t qualify as supporting a genocide, I’m not sure what does.
Students, faculty, staff, administrators, trustees of BU — anyone with a conscience — we can, and should, do something. Even though most of us don’t have skills that allow us to show up at refugee camps and be of service, we can still do something useful. Boston University ought to follow its socially conscious peer institutions and divest from companies colluding with the Sudanese government. Like I said already, it really isn’t hard. It starts with two simple words: disclose and divest.
Melissa Graboyes, a graduate student in the School of Public Health, is a weekly columnist for The Daily Free Press. She can be reached at [email protected].
