My colleagues at work may be pleased to hear that I have lost my voice!  But it was for a good cause and hopefully it won’t be for very long.

I guess I got a bit carried away on Saturday at the London pre-G8 rally (organized by the major UK churches, NGOs and trade unions) chanting G8, The World Can’t Wait!

Arriving at the main square in Westminster for an 11 a.m. photo shoot and press interview alongside musicians Annie Lennox and Midge Ure (great singers such that I was a bit upset when my 17 year-old son did not recognise them) as well as fellow campaigner Kumi Naidoo (a new breed of Civil Society rock star in his own right) from the Global Call to Action Against Poverty, I was ready to discuss what the German G8 should do next week to help achieve the MDGs.  However, I soon realized that that most of the tourists, campaigners and the media out and about on that nice sunny morning found a much more interesting visual and story in the Pants on Poverty group, who have been active since the Make Poverty History initiative in 2005. I should have known by now that nothing makes better TV than attractive young men and women who display anti-poverty slogans on their undergarments.

Shortly after, the organizers politely herded us to the venue of the Panel Debate on the G8 at the impressive Emmanuel Centre, not far from the Westminster Abbey.  The Debate was only one of the many events that were happening throughout the day for which campaigners had travelled from across the country.  The main auditorium was huge and I was told it could hold a capacity audience of 1000. There were many fun activities all taking place at the same time, like making placards and face painting, such that only the true die-hards could come to the most serious part of the day’s programme- the Debate.  I was amazed to see over 500 people in the room waiting to listen to the five of us speak and answer questions. 

After the Debate, I found myself in front of the old Tate Gallery on a boat filled with fellow campaigners from CAFOD (the main Catholic international development NGO in the UK), Oxfam GB, etc. as well as a great all-women choir with a couple of Masai drummers to boot. Given the assortment of people on the boat at times it felt a bit like Noah’s Arc.  The boat went along the banks of the Thames, lined with over 5000 campaigners wearing white and cheering us on, from the Tate up to Lambeth Bridge and back.  We made the most noise each time that we sailed past the Houses of Parliament.  It was also great to see loads of people from the Micah Challenge, one of the Christian campaigns focused on the mid-point of the MDGs, with their Blow the Half time Whistlebanners. Tear Fund and World Vision are spearheading the Micah movement in the UK.   

It was a bit paradoxical because the theme for the G8 campaigns, under the banner of the Global Call to Action Against Poverty or the whiteband movement this year, is Your Voice Against Poverty but my enthusiastic sloganeering on the boat resulted in I losing my voice. Annie Lennox on the other hand was much smarter-she let us do the shouting and singing. 

But all in all it was a very inspiring event.  There was extensive media coverage until about 3 p.m., at which point we began to receive worrying reports of trouble at the Rostock rally in Germany that shortly thereafter settled down. 

Events such as the one in London happened in several G8 countries and in Africa.  We expect the civil society petition to Angela Merkel and the G8 leaders to be signed by a million people before the G8. The promises made in Gleneagles in 2005 about meeting the 8th Millennium Development Goal on more aid, better aid, debt relief and trade for the poor were limited, but even those limited promises seem to be at risk now. 

Although we celebrate some success in the last decade among the poorest countries (20 million more kids go to school now, infant mortality has come down by 20-30% and about 300 million people are said to have come out of extreme poverty), with 1400 women dying every day during childbirth and related complications, almost all of which are preventable, we need the G8 leaders to act and to act now. 

Indeed, The World Can’t Wait.   
 
Salil Shetty is the Director of the United Nations Millennium Campaign. Learn more.