Free Yunus

UPDATE

from 07 August 2024

„We will do everything in our power to preserve your life’s work for humanity.”

That was the last sentence of my letter to Prof. Muhammad Yunus on 13 February. I had offered him the chance to come to Germany to escape political persecution in Bangladesh, which threatened him with life imprisonment. Yunus thanked me but declined - his place was in his home country.

Yesterday, it was not Nobel Peace Prize winner Yunus who left Bangladesh, but long-time Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. She was the one who wanted to put the founder of the Grameen Bank and Bangladesh's most famous citizen in prison, she was the one who initially put down the growing resistance of the students with bloodshed - and now had to give way to it. A new chapter begins for Bangladesh.

Spiegel Online reports today: „The student movement, which had urged Hasina to resign, has meanwhile made it clear that it is seeking an interim government under the leadership of Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus. "Any government other than the one we have proposed will not be accepted," said Nahid Islam, one of the main organisers of the student movement, in a Facebook video with three other organisers. "We will not accept any government that is supported or led by the military." According to Islam, there have already been talks with Yunus, who has agreed to take responsibility.”

I am happy and grateful that Muhammad Yunus remains a free man and can continue his life's work.

Prof Günter Faltin

 

FREE YUNUS

6 months in prison.


This is the sentence handed down a few days ago by a court in Bangladesh against Muhammad Yunus. The now 83-year-old is alleged to have failed to set up a social fund for the employees of Grameen Telecom, the company he founded. And a further 199 cases are currently pending against him.
The reason for this is not Prof Yunus' criminal energy. There is no such thing. It is a campaign that Hasina Wajed, the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, has been waging against the country's most prominent citizen for more than a decade. In 2007, Yunus considered founding his own party. This made him a potentially dangerous political rival for Wajed - whom she wants to eliminate at all costs. I got to know Muhammad Yunus in the mid-1990s, when he was still a largely unknown economics professor from Bangladesh. In 2001, he agreed to become a member of the Board of Trustees of my Entrepreneurship Foundation. I could not have wished for a better appointment.

Prof Yunus raised the topic of micro-entrepreneurship. According to his theory, the poor in particular are entrepreneurs because they have no other options. And they are also thrifty and efficient in their use of money because they have so little of it. However, they are entrepreneurs under extremely poor conditions. Even with the smallest amounts of money - microloans - they are able to start their own business. What sounded like a crazy new theory to Western ears was actually quite something. Muhammad Yunus had tried it out - and it worked. First on a very small scale and then on an ever larger scale. In 2006, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his theory and practice.

"A leader like Muhammad Yunus should be celebrated and free to contribute to improving the lives of people and the planet. The last place he should be is in prison." This is what former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon had to say about the Bangladeshi government's inconceivable actions. And in August 2023, 108 Nobel Laureates wrote to Prime Minister Wajed (see link): "Professor Yunus is a leading example of how Bangladesh and Bangladeshis have contributed to global progress in recent decades. We sincerely wish that he be able to continue his path-breaking work free of persecution or harassment." That speaks to my heart. But even they have not been able to stop Wajed's vendetta.

The life and life's work of this outstanding man must be defended. By the world, by you, by me.

Prof Günter Faltin

Bangladesh: Stop weaponizing labour law to harass Nobel Laureate Mohammad Yunus

Authorities in Bangladesh must stop weaponizing labour laws and immediately end their harassment and intimidation of the Nobel Peace Laureate Mohammad Yunus, Amnesty International said today.

Mohammad Yunus, who is also the chairman of the board at Grameen Telecom, is accused of employment-related violations and faces a criminal case in Bangladesh under the Labour Act 2006. Three other board members, Ashraful Hasan, Nur Jahan Begum and Mohammad Shahjahan, face the same charges.

The ongoing trial is just one of more than 150 cases filed against Mohammad Yunus after the ruling Awami League party came into power in 2008. Amnesty International believes that initiating criminal proceedings against Mohammad Yunus and his colleagues for issues that belong to the civil and administrative arena is a blatant abuse of labour laws and the justice system and a form of political retaliation for his work and dissent.

Read more

Protect Yunus

Twelve U.S. Senators Call for the Ending the Harassment of Professor Yunus

Following on an August letter signed by 190 global leaders, including 108 Nobel laureates, demanding that the Bangladesh Prime Minister end her campaign violating the human and legal rights of Professor Yunus, 12 prominent U.S. Senators from both major U.S. parties wrote their own critical letter to the PM today, which was sent with an accompanying press release.

They wrote, “We write urging you to end to the persistent harassment of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus—and the pattern of abusing laws and the justice system to target critics of the government more broadly.” And they added that Professor Yunus’ positive “efforts should not be undermined over ongoing political vendettas, especially in a democratic nation of laws.”

They concluded by saying, “Ending the harassment of Professor Yunus, and others exercising their freedom of speech to criticize the government, will help continue this important relationship [between the United States and Bangladesh].”

Interestingly, the Senators did not congratulate Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on her recent uncontested and disputed “re-election,” implying that they did not recognize it as legitimate.

This comes one day after the highly respected Professor Rehman Sobhan — who was once appointed as the chairman of Grameen Bank by the Prime Minister when she was in power in the 1990s — wrote a highly critical article in the Daily Star and the Dhaka Tribune warning Bangladesh’s citizens that they have much to fear from their own government if such a flawed legal case against Professor Yunus could proceed as far as it has. He lamented, “Over the years the weaponization of the judicial system has become part of a wider assault on our institutions of democracy and governance…. The case of Professor Yunus is symptomatic of this erosion in the credibility of our institutions. The triviality and narrowness of the case against Yunus would not have made it to first base in any well functioning judicial system.” 

The entire text of the U.S. Senate letter appears below:

January 22, 2024

Dear Prime Minister Hasina,

We write urging you to end the persistent harassment of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus—and the pattern of abusing laws and the justice system to target critics of the government more broadly.

For more than a decade, Professor Yunus has faced more than 150 unsubstantiated cases brought against him in Bangladesh. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk and human rights organizations such as Amnesty International have noted irregularities in proceedings against him, including the most recent six month prison sentencing for allegedly violating the country’s labor laws that is being appealed. These reputable organizations argue the speed and repeated use of criminal proceedings are indicative of politically motivated judicial abuses. Moreover, the repeated and sustained harassment of Yunus mirrors what many Bangladeshi civil society members also face in an increasingly restrictive environment.

Yunus’ pioneering work on microfinance offered greater economic promise for many Bangladeshis and millions of impoverished people around the world. The United States Congress awarded him the Congressional Gold Medal in 2013, recognizing his pioneering contributions to the fight against global poverty. Such efforts should not be undermined over ongoing political vendettas, especially in a democratic nation of laws.

The United States values its longstanding relationship with Bangladesh, which includes close bilateral and multilateral coordination on numerous common interests. Ending the harassment of Professor Yunus, and others exercising their freedom of speech to criticize the government, will help continue this important relationship.

Thank you for your prompt consideration of this matter.

Read more

testsuche

Stiftung Entrepreneurship supports the protest against the imprisonment of Prof Yunus.

We offer to help, exchange information and coordinate forms of protest.

If you would also like to support actions for the release of Prof Yunus and want to be informed about new developments, please write to us:  

free_yunus(@)entrepreneurship.de

or give us a call: +49-30-992115477

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