Suddenly the big money sponsors of the Olympic Games are re-branding themselves as born-again companies with a social conscience, as champions of the poor perhaps?
“[H]aving spent huge sums, the companies sponsoring the Beijing games are about to find themselves the targets of a new, more vigorous war on China’s human rights record by campaigners boosted by the success of protests along the torch relay route”. Source: © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2008, cited in “Mail&Guardianonline” Johannesburg, South Africa
There are 12 sponsoring companies who apparently signed a four year deal with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and paid between $30 million and $40 million included are, for example, Coca-Cola, and McDonalds . However, the companies have interests further afield than China.
The global protest strategy seems to be changing; it is now turning to the companies who have invested millions of dollars in support of gaining high profile media attention in a country where there is a great deal of money to be made by corporations exploiting the Olympic mandate.
However, it is the corporate sponsors who will now become engaged in this push for change.
“Companies [who do not act] will get physical protests; they will get letters; we will ask people to turn off their adverts,” said Ellen Freudenheim, director of corporate outreach at Dream for Darfur…
Sponsors don’t make policy and we understand that. But combined they have about the equivalent of the GDP (Gross Domestic Profit) of Canada, the world’s eighth largest economy; they have government affairs offices; they have lobbying firms; they have international presences — and they all do engage in politics.”.
Amnesty (Asia-Pacific) reminds corporations that they do have an obligation to respect the rights of people, as do governments, and one might add that “the bottom line” of a a basic right for the poor is to live a life that is higher than poor, not lower: in poverty.
Tags: Coca-Cola | EXPLOITING | McDonalds | Olympics 2008 | protest | PROTESTING | sponsors | western corporations | World
