World Bank Presidency: Development or Politics first?

UPDATE: Shortly after President Obama nominated Dr. Jim Yong Kim for the post, Dr Sachs withdrew his candidacy in support of Dr Kim, his decision was communicated through Dr. Sachs' spokeswoman Erin Trowbridge.

Robert Zoellick has already stated that he will not seek a reelection as WB president, with this setting Dr, Jeffrey Sachs proposed himself as a candidate with various convincing arguments through some articles in

Time Magazine and also in the Washington Post

I am also attaching below a very quick interview that Dr Sachs made with CNN explaining why he considers to be an ideal candidate:

Personally I would love to see Dr Sachs as President, however despite the fact that 27 US representatives sent a letter to President Obama asking him to nominate Dr Sachs as the US candidate for the presidency of WB, a few minutes ago the Obama administration decided to nominate Dr. Jim Yong Kim

The third candidate as of March 23rd is Ms Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala who is the current Finance Minister of Nigeria, and has the support of Angola, Nigeria and South Africa.

It seems that everything is decided already, given the fact that the US has an important advantage regarding voting powers at the WB, despite that Dr Sachs has support from developing nations such as Bhutan, East Timor, Haiti, Kenya, Guatemala and one OECD country (Chile), it was rumored that Brazil could support Dr Sachs' presidency, however this is not confirmed.

I just hope that whoever is the next candidate, the next president should further develop the relation of WB with all the nations in the world, specially developing countries.

Finally I wanted to  share an portion of a very interesting article written by three former chief economists of the World Bank - Francois Bourguignon, Nicholas Stern and Joseph Stiglitzwho strongly argue about the need to put an end to the US "monopoly" on running the institution:

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The article comes from FT (Financial Times), you can find the complete article here

........ Developed countries have a majority of voting shares in the World Bank and the IMF, and so control the leadership of these institutions. We are now close to the turning point where developing countries will represent half of real global output. They already drive global growth. More important, the developing countries represent 6bn of the 7bn world population.

Our recommendation is not to swap an arbitrary rule, by which the president of the World Bank must be American, for another, only slightly less arbitrary, by which he or she should come from a developing country. It is to allow the best people to be considered for that position, whatever their origin.
The developed countries have declared the importance of an “open, transparent and merit-based process” many times. They have recognised the importance of trust, credibility and collaboration in overcoming global challenges, particularly that of poverty. Yet when the moment comes for decision, they cannot resist the temptation to perpetuate the monopoly. This is not only hypocritical, it also destroys the trust and spirit of collaboration needed to manage the profound problems facing the world.
Developed countries’ control of the selection process also discourages developing countries from putting forward a candidate who might have broad support among them. As a result, there is a risk that the choices offered the Executive Board will, in practice, be very limited.............

The writers are former chief economists and senior vice-presidents of the World Bank