World Bank staff have been instructed to grant preferential treatment to the son of David Malpass, a senior Trump administration official and current World Bank president. From the leaked recording that this information is said to have originated from and which was reported by the whistleblower Watchman This appears to have followed the US Treasury’s decision to increase funding to the World Bank by US$13 billion (nearly €12 billion). Robert Malpass, aged 22 at the time, is referred to as “Prince” in the recording.
In addition, records appear to indicate that the World Bank has hired a relative of a key figure in international politics at least once before. “Don’t forget we’ve had ‘Prince’ before,” one of the employees said in the recording.
The World Bank calls the notion that there is a link between hiring Robert Malpass and increasing funding “false and absurd”. However, in the recording, an employee can be heard explicitly mentioning the role David Malpass played in obtaining the capital injection.
The director of the social justice group Now, Nick Dearden, reacted sharply to the news. He told the British newspaper, “The World Bank lectures countries around the world about corruption and good governance, but we are now seeing clear signs that the organization is guided by money.” “This will further erode the reputation and legitimacy of the World Bank, but also hopefully accelerate the transition to shaping international institutions that reflect the world we want to build, not the world we need to leave behind.”
