The Millennium Challenge Corporation’s board will not be legally allowed to make any decisions — from approving new countries to addressing challenges with existing large-scale grants — after September if the U.S. Congress doesn’t approve new private sector board members.
The U.S. aid agency’s board has just one of its four private sector members remaining — Ander Crenshaw — and his term is up in September. The other three had their terms expire in 2022. By law, the board, which has both government officials and those private sector representatives, won’t have the quorum necessary for decision-making once he leaves.
Come the December board meeting, MCC will be unable to approve new countries for its compact agreements, or large-scale grants, to support infrastructure projects and economic development in the well-governed low-income countries, unless a new private sector board member is approved. It would also mean the board cannot cancel projects when things go wrong — for example, its individual and regional compacts with Niger, where there has just been a coup.
About the author
Adva Saldinger@AdvaSal
Adva Saldinger is a Senior Reporter at Devex where she covers development finance, as well as U.S. foreign aid policy. Adva explores the role the private sector and private capital play in development and authors the weekly Devex Invested newsletter bringing the latest news on the role of business and finance in addressing global challenges. A journalist with more than 10 years of experience, she has worked at several newspapers in the U.S. and lived in both Ghana and South Africa.
