In response to:
Madeleine Bunting, June 4, 2007 The Guardian

While, on the whole you make some pretty good points, it does concern me that you seem to regard Bob Geldof as synonymous with the Make Poverty History Campaign, when, in reality, the two were, to a large extent seperate.

The Make Poverty History campaign was led by GCAP (the Global Call to Action Against Poverty), made up of NGOs worldwide. Some of them, such as Oxfam have been in the business of international development for over 50 years now, longer than most governmental agencies, and with it have a tremendous amount of experience and knowledge of its intricacies. If you bothered to look, the aims of MPH were very clear and achievable, asking G8 nations to live up to their promise of a 0.7% (made almost a decade ago) contribution of GDP to international aid, measurable and systematic cancellation of debt for specific countries etc.

Your real target is idiot Geldof and his cohorts. Unlike Oxfam, ActionAid, WDM or any of the other big NGOs, Mr Geldof does not represent a constituency, supporters fundraisers, campaigners, partners in the developing world or otherwise. He represents himself. You will recall that unlike the planned and strategic long-term campaign of MPH, spread over the year at specific points, ‘Live8′ was announced no more than a month in advance, seemingly because Bob and co woke up one morning and decided it would be a nice thing to do.

Consequently, when July 2nd came round, it was the rock stars, and what they had eaten for breakfast that made the front pages, rather than the millions of ordinary people who took to the streets that day, not just in the UK, but in the developing world also, in order to demand a better deal for themselves. They did not, it seem, need Geldof to speak on their behalf.

You’re right though; Geldof’s idiotic proclaimation to his assembled worshippers of ‘mission accomplished, frankly’, was a disaster. To hijack a campaign is irritating. To prematurely call it to a close is catastrophic. None of the credible organizations in MPH believed business would be finished at Gleneagles. These organizations employ entire teams of researchers and economists who knew from the word go that mission was not accomplished. They have partner organizations and agencies in Africa and Asia who knew for a fact the limitations of what was promised at Gleneagles. Did Geldof? No, but he’d shaken hands with ‘I’m a pretty straight guy’ Tony Blair, which was enough for him.

It was always going to be difficult to mantain the coalition and momentum built, with great success, by the Make Poverty History Coalition. Despite that, however, the organizations which put 2005 on the map as the year of reckoning posessed the will and to some extent the means to do it, had it not been for Geldof. Like his ego, he inflated the campaign we began, filling it with hot air, too quickly, and too big. And when he was done with it, he popped it.

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