Early Reactions to the Nomination of Jim Yong Kim as President of the World Bank

Release Time: 


For Immediate Release



Secretary of the Treasury Timothy F. Geithner
“Jim Yong Kim is exceptionally well qualified to serve as President of the World Bank. He is an innovative leader whose groundbreaking work to fight disease and combat poverty has saved lives around the globe. But Jim will bring more to the role than an impressive record of designing new ways to solve entrenched problems. Development is his lifetime commitment, and it is his passion. And in a world with so much potential to improve living standards, we have a unique opportunity to harness that passion and experience at the helm of the World Bank.”

Former President Bill Clinton
"Jim Kim is an inspired and outstanding choice to lead the World Bank based on his years of commitment and leadership to development and particularly health care and AIDS treatment across the world.  Among his many accomplishments, his work with my good friend Paul Farmer to bring hope and health care to nations from Haiti to Peru to Malawi through Partners in Health has been pioneering, exceptional and effective.  He will be the most experienced development expert to ever take the helm of the World Bank and I compliment President Obama for putting that type of proven commitment to global development at the top of his criteria for choosing the World Bank’s next leader."

Rwandan President Paul Kagame
“I was delighted to learn that Jim Kim has been nominated for this post, as he is a true friend of Africa and well known for his decade of work to support us in developing an efficient health system in Rwanda. He’s not only a physician and a leader who knows what it takes to address poverty, but also a genuinely good person. President Obama’s nomination of Dr. Kim as President of the World Bank is a welcome one, and should resonate well with the many men and women who are working to transform lives around the world."

Paul Farmer, MD, PhD
“Jim Yong Kim is an outstanding choice for the presidency of the World Bank. Having had the good fortune to train with Jim at Harvard, and to see him work in settings from inner-city Boston to the slums of Peru, from Haiti to Rwanda to the prisons of Siberia, I know that for three decades Jim has committed himself to breaking the cycle of poverty and disease.  This has been his goal as a physician, a teacher, a policy maker, and a university president; it was ever his goal as a founder and director of Partners In Health, which now operates in more than a dozen countries and informs his teaching and writing. He has worked in rural villages and squatter settlements just as he has worked in the halls of power and privilege. Again and again, we his friends and colleagues have seen Jim imagine a better future, one that harnesses new technologies and older but sound notions of justice and equity, and links this vision to much more than talk and reports and studies. Jim is all about delivery and about delivering on promises often made but too seldom kept. I can think of no one more able to help families, communities, and entire nations break out of poverty, which is the stated goal of the World Bank. As poverty continues to claim lives, and as inequality deepens, the Bank--and other institutions charged with lessening poverty--need bold and experienced thinkers and implementers like Jim Kim. Alas, he's one of a kind.”

Jeffrey Sachs
“Jim Kim is a superb nominee for WB. I support him 100%. I thank all who supported me and know they'll be very pleased with today's news.” – via Twitter

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