WB chief Jim Yong Kim announces resignation

WASHINGTON: World Bank President Jim Yong Kim announced Monday he would step down next month, more than three years before his current term was due to expire.

The decision ends Kim´s six-year tenure and may give US President Donald Trump decisive influence over the future leadership of the global development lender.

“It has been a great honor to serve as president of this remarkable institution, full of passionate individuals dedicated to the mission of ending extreme poverty in our lifetime,” Kim said in a statement.

Kim, who became president in 2012, is to join an as-yet unnamed firm focusing on investments in developing countries, the bank said in a statement, and will return to the board of Partners-in-Health, which he co-founded.

Under Kim´s leadership, the bank set the goal of eliminating extreme poverty by 2030 and ramped up financing.

Last year, it also won approval for a sharp $13 billion capital increase after acceding to requests from the Trump administration to curb loans to high-income countries like China.

Kim´s tenure was also marked by high levels of disaffection among World Bank staff, who chafed at a widespread internal restructuring that Kim began.

World Bank CEO Kristalina Georgieva will serve as interim president upon Kim´s February 1 departure, the bank said in a statement.

 

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