SAN DIEGO “”mdash; The UC Board of Regents committed Thursday to
further analyze the effects of divesting from its business holdings
in Sudan and inform certain companies of its concern over the
activities of the Sudanese government, but delayed a vote on full
divestment until March.
Since early last year, University of California students have
led an effort to pressure the board to divest from Sudan, a country
with a government that has been committing genocide in Darfur for
more than two years. Student activists argue that by maintaining
holdings in Sudan, the university is in effect supporting the
government’s activities.
Thursday’s meeting at UC San Diego was the first time the
full board had addressed the topic of divestment from Sudan.
The board was scheduled to vote on the UC’s divestment
options Thursday, but the UC Office of the President could not yet
provide the regents with sufficient information on the effects of
divestment for regents to be comfortable making a final
decision.
Instead, the board voted to form a study group to analyze the
impact of UC divestment. It also resolved to contact firms with
business in Sudan to note the UC’s consideration of
divestment.
Divestment in Sudan is complicated by the UC’s investment
in indexes made up of groups of companies. The UC would have to
pull funds from indexes rather than from individual companies if
the regents decide to divest.
Student Regent Adam Rosenthal said the regents’ decision
to form a study group is the first in a two step process toward
divestment, the second of which will be for the board to vote in
March on whether to divest.
“Because of the complexity of divestment it was necessary
to take it slowly in two steps,” he said.
Regent David Lee, whose term is expiring in March along with
that of Regent Tom Sayles, pointed to another issue that
complicates divestment: the potential of divestment having harmful
effects of already poor Sudanese people.
Lee said by taking economic investments out of poor countries,
institutions run the risk of making life harder for already poor
residents of that country.
To ensure that the divestment would not adversely affect the
people of Darfur, Lee said the regents should only divest from
companies that directly support the Sudanese government and not
those that support the Sudanese people.
But many UC students were emphatic about the need for
divestment.
About 200 students were present at the meeting during the
discussion, and Jeannie Biniek, external vice president for the
Undergraduate Students Association Council, estimated that about
500 total students were present at the divestment events and that
about 100 of them were from UCLA.
At the public comment session before the regents’
discussion on divestment, students had a chance to address the
board. UCLA student Shannon Chao began to cry as she spoke to the
regents of losing family members during the genocide in Cambodia,
which took place during the 1970s.
“The only reason I’m standing beside you today is
because my mother was able to survive unlike so many millions of
others. … I urge you to divest so that people like my mother can
survive and have children like me,” she said.
Students who attended the meeting said they were disappointed
that the vote was delayed but said they were encouraged by the
regents’ decision to take action toward divestment.
Students gathered at a rally and silent memorial outside the
regents meeting carrying signs that said “stop the dollars,
stop the dying”.
During the memorial, students imitated the dead in Darfur by
lying silently on the ground.
Co-Chairman of the UC Sudan Divestment Taskforce Jason Miller
said given the urgency of the situation in Darfur the divestment
decision cannot be delayed forever.
“Every month that passes is another month more people
die,” he said.
Students from the divestment taskforce were also pleased with
the board’s decision to analyze divestment options for more
companies than the Committee on Investments had proposed.
According to the KLD Sudan Compliance Service, an investment
research firm, as many as 120 companies could be supporting the
Sudan government with their businesses.
At the November 2005 meeting, the board’s finance
committee voted to analyze divestment options from the four
companies which Stanford University has already divested from, but
students pressured the regents to consider targeted divestment from
more companies as well.
Regent Gerald Parsky said though divestment is a tool that
should only be used very carefully, the situation in Darfur
“cries for us to act.”
The formation of a committee and talking to companies in Sudan
is action, but we must be very careful about how we act, he
said.
Regent Norman Pattiz said the decision not to vote seemed to be
the best option considering the regents did not have the necessary
information to make a definite vote on divestment, but also
expressed frustration at the delay and said he hoped the vote would
not get postponed again in March.
“Every day that this goes on, is a day that some of us
feel unclean,” he said.
Edward Alpers, a UCLA history professor who teaches a Fiat Lux
seminar on the crisis in Darfur, compared divestment from Sudan to
the regent’s decision to divest from apartheid South Africa
in 1986.
The regents have a moral responsibility to divest from Sudan due
to the social costs and human rights abuses in Darfur which are
comparable to that of apartheid, he said.
“In view of the disastrous human rights violations in
Darfur, can we afford not to divest?” he asked the board.