[asia-apec 840] GATT Watchdog on Moore WTO bid

[Gatt Watchdog]

GATT Watchdog
PO Box 1905
Christchurch
Aotearoa/New Zealand

MEDIA RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE USE
1 November 1998

Moore WTO Bid: Where do we send the money? asks fair trade group

GATT Watchdog believes that the New Zealand Government has inadvertently
launched a powerful weapon against the World Trade Organisation by backing
former Prime Minister Mike Moore for the Director General's position. 

The fair trade coalition, which has been at the forefront of campaigns against
the MAI, APEC and the GATT/WTO, is throwing its support behind Mr Moore's
candidacy and promises a whip round among its committee this week after
learning that Mr Moore's WTO campaign will cost over $500,000. 

"Already gambling people in our networks are taking bets as to how long it
will take for Mike Moore to discredit and destroy the WTO if he gets the nod.
Should he succeed in his bid it could be the kiss of death for the
WTO," said a GATT Watchdog spokesperson, Aziz Choudry.

"The credibility and agenda of the WTO has already been challenged by many
peoples' movements worldwide.  The kind of deregulated, market driven
development which the WTO promotes is leading to even greater divisions
between rich and poor in all countries as local communities and nations lose
genuine control over their futures, and as economic and political power is
transferred to unaccountable multilateral institutions."

"We believe that in backing Mr Moore, the Shipley minority government has
inadvertently unleashed a secret, devastating weapon against the WTO, the
likes of which the world has probably never seen.  We will urge our national
and international networks to back Mr Moore's bid as part of our strategy to
delegitimise the WTO and push for a just international trade regime which is
not merely a set of rights and freedoms for global capital and the
transnational corporations which dominate the world economy."

Mr Moore has, in his eagerness to avoid substantiating his arguments in favour
of trade and investment liberalisation, described New Zealand critics of APEC,
the GATT/WTO and the MAI as "grumpy geriatric communists",
"a mutant strain of the Left... who tuck their shirts into their underpants"
and "primitives who, if they had their way, would throw New Zealand and our
region into chaos and depression".  

"When his capacity for never stopping the facts from getting in the way of a
chance to rave maniacally about the supposed wonders of free trade and
investment becomes more widely known, we feel sure that his competitors will
concede defeat.  This would surely be an important prerequisite for the WTO
top job."

"But in the meantime, where do we send the money towards his campaign costs?" 

For further details contact Aziz Choudry, GATT Watchdog, ph (03) 3662803