The Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, founding father of Grameen Financial institution, is credited with lifting hundreds of thousands out of poverty within the nation of Bangladesh. Grameen turned well-known for pioneering the idea of microcredit, granting loans of underneath $100 to Bangladesh’s rural poor. That helped spark a worldwide motion which helped win Yunus the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006. However a Bangladeshi courtroom now desires so as to add one thing else to Yunus’s résumé: A six-month prison sentence.
On Monday, a choose in Dhaka convicted Yunus and three executives of Grameen Telecom of failing to create a welfare fund for workers, amongst different violations of labor regulation. The choose sentenced Yunus to 6 months in jail.
The Nobel laureate referred to as the decision “contrary to all legal precedent and logic” in a press release on Monday, and referred to as upon Bangladeshis to talk in “one voice against injustice.”
Who’s Muhammad Yunus?
Yunus based Grameen Financial institution in October 1983, and the financial institution has since lent over $37.5 billion to Bangladesh’s poor at a restoration price of 97%. The financial institution is credited for boosting the South Asian nation’s development by way of small money loans, principally to rural ladies, for investing in farming instruments or different enterprise gear. The financial institution lists 12 indicators on its web site to find out when certainly one of its clients has moved out of poverty.
Grameen’s success helped pioneer the microcredit mannequin of growth. Proponents argued that small microloans to these with out regular employment or good collateral might assist encourage entrepreneurship amongst poorer populations, as clients used the funds to begin micro- and small-sized enterprises. Microfinance has since come underneath hearth for not being able to ship on its lofty objectives, but some analysts argue that offering access to monetary companies nonetheless makes a distinction to the poor.
Along with profitable the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006, Yunus has acquired many different accolades together with Bangladesh’s Independence Day Award, the nation’s highest award.
But Yunus is much less well-liked amongst Bangladesh’s present authorities, together with prime minister Sheikh Hasina. She has accused Yunus of “sucking blood from the poor,” and alleged that the banker helped block international funding for infrastructure tasks.
The Grameen founder was as soon as a possible political rival to Hasina, briefly entertaining the thought of beginning his personal political social gathering quickly after profitable his Nobel Prize.
Yunus now faces over 100 charges, together with different labor regulation violations and alleged graft. The authorized marketing campaign in opposition to Yunus has drawn the eye of worldwide figures like former U.S. president Barack Obama and former UN secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon, who each signed onto a letter in August denouncing the “continuous judicial harassment” of Yunus.
Bangladesh will maintain its parliamentary elections on Sunday, with the Awami League, led by Hasina, aiming for its fourth consecutive victory. Hasina is likely to win the election, as Bangladesh’s principal opposition events are boycotting the polls. Activists say they do not believe a free and truthful election might be held underneath a Hasina authorities. A number of opposition leaders are additionally in jail.
Regardless of promising to carry free and truthful elections, “state authorities are simultaneously filling prisons with the ruling Awami League’s political opponents,” wrote Julia Beckner, senior Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch, in November. The NGO claims authorities have arrested virtually 10,000 opposition activists since a political rally from the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Occasion in late October.
