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World Bank President, Jim Yong Kim has announced that he would step down next month, more than three years before his current term was due to expire.
The decision ends Kim’s six-year tenure and may give US President Donald Trump decisive influence over the future leadership of the 189-member global development lender.
“It has been a great honor to serve as president of this remarkable institution, full of passionate individuals dedicated to the mission of ending extreme poverty in our lifetime,” Kim, 59, said in a statement.
Kim, who became the bank’s president in 2012, is to join an unnamed firm focusing on investments in developing countries, the bank said in a statement, and will return to the board of Partners-in-Health, which he co-founded. World Bank CEO Kristalina Georgieva will serve as interim president upon Kim’s February 1 departure, the bank said in a statement.
Under Kim’s leadership, the bank set the goal of eliminating extreme poverty 2030 and ramped up financing. Last year, it also won approval for a sharp $13 billion capital increase after acceding to requests from the Trump administration to curb loans to high-income countries like China.
