Contact: Jack Ucciferri – 707.252.6166
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 10, 2008
Napa, California
Bank of America Fails to Keep Human Rights Off Shareholder Ballot
Napa, California - The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has advised Bank of America (BAC) should not exclude a bylaw resolution to authorize creation of a Board Committee on Human Rights.
The resolution, which will be voted on at BAC's April 23 annual meeting of shareholders, was filed by Harrington Investments, Inc., (HII) a socially responsible investment advisory firm.
"They fought hard to exclude this modest proposal from their proxy. I was surprised and disappointed that BAC was so resistant to the notion that strategic management of human rights issues is part of the board's fiduciary responsibility to shareowners, especially given the company's substantial investments in a bank that is controlled by the Chinese totalitarian regime," said John Harrington, CEO of Harrington Investments.
Bank of America currently has no policy whatsoever regarding human rights. This is highly anachronistic among multinational corporations, particularly in the banking sector, a sector that has historically had extensive exposure to human rights controversies.
Bank of America's reach is truly global, with known operations in countries such as China, India, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brazil, and Mexico. BAC owns a 19.9% stake the Construction Bank of China (CBC), which finances the China National Petroleum Corporation which is significantly involved in Sudan. The CBC also helped to finance SINOPEC, a Chinese oil and gas corporation which continues to do business with Burma's military regime. Such globally dispersed operations pose obvious risks of direct and indirect involvement in human rights abuses.
Bank loans are traditionally disbursed to private, public, and often, foreign government corporations which may participate in arms and weapons manufacturing, trafficking, and servicing. There are currently no requirements that specific lending activities of foreign government controlled entities owned by Bank of America be disclosed to BAC shareholders or the public.
The proposal suggests using such universally recognized documents as the US Bill of Rights and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as nonbinding benchmarks or reference documents for the committee.
While binding bylaw resolutions are still a relatively untested approach to shareowner advocacy, "We believe that if corporate irresponsibility continues to impose undue costs on shareholders, bylaw resolutions will be increasingly relied upon to responsibly advocate for better corporate performance," concluded Harrington.
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