As about 2,000 bodies lay sprawled as if dead on the Boston Common yesterday, symbolizing the magnitude of the death toll in the Darfur region in Sudan, local activists made yet another statement in their push to bring attention to the conflict-ridden area.
In the past few months, activists have stepped up efforts to stop what they say is the U.S. funding of the Sudanese government that has sponsored a militia that murdered more than 400,000 people in the Darfur region. Activist groups at the state and federal level have been calling for the government and businesses to divest funding in companies that have business ties to the region in hopes of cutting off support to the militia.
Students at colleges nationwide have played a growing role in raising awareness by forming groups, holding benefit concerts and sending petitions to their representatives. Yesterday’s rally was organized by Students Taking Action Now: Darfur and the Massachusetts Coalition to Save Darfur, and students did most of the planning.
STAND Northeast Outreach Coordinator Leila Alciere, a Brandeis University sophomore, said the rally was organized to put pressure on lawmakers as they prepare to vote on a bill that would force the commonwealth to divest its state pension fund from companies with holdings in Sudan.
“State divestment has been one of the primary focuses of [Massachusetts] STAND chapters all semester, and this is the critical time for that legislation,” Alciere said in an email.
During a March 29 hearing at the State House, activist groups and lawmakers pleaded with the Senate to pass the pending bill, sponsored by Harriette Chandler (D-Worcester). The bill unanimously passed the Joint Committee on Public Service on April 19, and was referred to the Senate Ways and Means Committee, where it still awaits a vote, last Monday.
And while the pressure has been growing for state governments to divest, universities have been feeling the push, too. Massachusetts Institute of Technology President Susan Hockfield refused to comment on the issue, and Boston University Board of Trustees Secretary Todd Klipp declined to comment further than he had for an April 5 article, when he said he believes BU does not need to change its relationship with Fidelity because university employees with Fidelity retirement plans can choose for themselves which companies those plans are invested in. Northeastern University spokesman Fred McGrail also declined to comment, saying his university does not comment on its investment policies.
U.S. colleges have especially been criticized by activists for their association with the investment company Fidelity, which offers retirement plans to faculty members. Fidelity owns almost 1.1 billion shares of PetroChina, which is Sudan’s biggest oil company, according to a March 28 USA Today report. At BU, staff and faculty have the choice of investing with Fidelity or TIAA-CREF, which does not invest in companies with ties to the Sudanese government.
School of Public Health graduate students Jirair Ratevosian and Emily Church wrote a letter to BU President Robert Brown on March 14, demanding the university divest from Fidelity.
“The most substantial relationship between Boston University and Fidelity Investments occurs through the retirement accounts of our faculty and staff,” Brown responded in a April 5 letter Ratevosian provided to The Daily Free Press. “Placing constraints on the investments of individuals is not an appropriate action for the University.”
After Ratevosian received the response, he and Church contacted an SPH Faculty Council representative requesting the topic be addressed last Wednesday during the semester’s final council meeting, but he was told there was not enough time to hear the issue. Although he said he and Church essentially lost their last chance to reach the faculty directly before they graduate, he has not lost hope.
“Good things are going to happen,” he said. “I think we’ll see changes. It would have given us a larger voice, but I don’t think this issue will die out. People care.”
Ratevosian said activist groups concerned about the Darfur conflict have gained power in recent months by collaborating efforts.
“The Fidelity out of Sudan campaign has joined forces with the National Darfur Movement, and the campaign is about to get much more visible and aggressive,” he said.
Activists believe the momentum for their cause will only get stronger as they earn the backing of lawmakers. They were joined at the rally yesterday by Sen. Edward Augustus (D-Worcester), the Rev. Gloria White-Hammond and U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.).
McGovern, who was arrested with four other members of Congress last year for protesting outside the Sudanese embassy in Washington, said the issue still lacks adequate attention.
Even if the commonwealth and other states divest their funds from companies with business dealings with the Sudanese government, McGovern said the international community must soon move to find a political solution with the Sudanese government or send a United Nations peacekeeping force to Darfur.
“The world community needs to work together,” he told the Free Press. “There needs to be a response. A lot of awful things happen in the world. This [conflict in Darfur] is so awful, it’s shocking.”
Others who say current divestment initatives are not enough include some Americans and others in the international community who are calling for a boycott of the 2008 Beijing Olympics to protest China’s dealings with Sudan, McGovern said.
Critics of calls for divestment say protesters wrongly blame Fidelity Investments for a relationship with the conflict that is indirect in nature. Spokesman Vin Loporchio said the company does not force its clients to invest in Sudanese-affiliated companies, but simply provides them with the option.
“It is important to note Fidelity is managing not its own money but rather the money of many investors,” Loporchio said in an email. “Those investors who choose Fidelity funds rightly expect that these funds will be managed in a way that seeks to achieve each fund’s investment objectives as well as comply with all governing laws.”
Sunish Oturkar, a member of the Northeastern chapter of STAND who attended the rally, said his group calls for divestment at all levels, including state and local governments, college campuses and corporate headquarters. The group has targeted Fidelity, he said, because it is the largest corporate investor in Sudanese-based companies.
“We do not want to attack Fidelity,” Oturkar said. “Instead, we would like to work with them.”
Ratevosian added any success activist groups have in working with companies like Fidelity, as well as other businesses and universities, will only matter if it could prevent more death in the Darfur region.
“Time is running out,” he said. “By September, many more will be dead if we don’t act now.”