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| Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
The Grameen Bank has enabled millions of women to lift themselves out of poverty by giving them tiny loans to buy animals or equipment to start earning money. But Bangladesh's jealous Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina, has fired its Nobel Prize winning founder Muhammad Yunus and now wants to seize control of the bank, all to silence a political rival. This takeover could break the bank and destroy millions of people's hope.
I worked in humanitarian and development aid for 25 years, I know personally of the Grameen Bank's work, it has simply done an OUTSTANDING job helping the poor! The international community has recognized Yunus's remarkable work by awarding him the Nobel Prize - AVAAZ is right: we can't let one powerful, envious woman destroy the hopes of millions of poor rural women - a small Grameen Bank loan is their only hope to break out of poverty and feed their children!
Help AVAAZ to force Hasina to back down. Sign the petition, I just did. Here's the link:
http://www.avaaz.org/en/save_the_world_best_bank/?cAXfecb
Save the world's best bank
sign the petition
To Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina:
Over the past three decades, Grameen has empowered millions of women and families in Bangladesh to break the shackles of poverty and inspired a worldwide microfinance revolution. You have the power to keep that hope alive. As global citizens, we urge you to stop the government takeover of Grameen Bank, starting with reversing the Grameen Bank Ordinance amendment that allows the government to bypass the people-elected board and handpick who runs the Bank.
As of October 9, Rome time 8 am: 73,428 have signed. Help AVAAZ get to 100,000!
Here's an interesting article that explains it all - gives you the info you need to take your decision:
Comments
Then comes this woman along, trying to destroy everything...
David Bornstein (who wrote the NYT article) is certainly a good source on this topic, although I wonder if the removal of Yunus was overblown outside of Bangladesh. While in line for Topkapi Palace in Istanbul last year, I struck up a conversation with two Bangladeshi fellows. They said that his removal occurred due to Bangladeshi laws regarding maximum length of years as a Managing Director, and that it happens all the time to other MDs in Bangladesh. Maybe Yunus's case got so much attention just because of who he is... or maybe there really is ill will and a vendetta against him... it's hard for anyone outside of the inner circles in Bangladeshi government to know.