Muhammad Yunus, a Bangladeshi Nobel laureate, has been sentenced to 6 months in jail. Why do rights groups see this as a "politically motivated" case, and what is the reason behind the friction between Yusuf and the Hasina government?
Bangladesh Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus at the Trento Economy Festival in Italy in 2022. Critics of the government say it has tried to harass and vilify the economist. (Image: Getty)
Yudhajit Shankar Das
New Delhi,UPDATED: Jan 4, 2024
Days before the general election in Bangladesh, Nobel Peace laureate and Grameen Bank founder Muhammad Yunus was convicted and sentenced to 6 months in jail for violation of labour laws. Critics of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government allege this to be a case of government retribution towards an internationally recognised person. Others, however, see it as a legal case filed by workers.
Why is a simple case of labour law violation being perceived as one that is politically motivated, and what is the reason for the bad blood between Muhammad Yunus and PM Seikh Hasina’s Awami League?
On Monday, Yunus and three of his colleagues of Grameen Telecom were given a 6-month jail term, but the labour court also gave them bail for a month, allowing them time to appeal in a higher court. They have been accused of violating labour laws for failing to create a workers’ welfare fund in the company. Grameen Telecom is one of the several firms founded by Yunus.
YUNUS CASE EMBLEMATIC OF PROBLEMS?
In a country where the government is viewed with suspicion of trying to “throttle opposition voices”, the verdict against the 83-year-old Nobel laureate is being projected as another instance of “erosion of freedoms” and a “bid to silence government critics”. But is that really so?
Bangladesh is headed for an election on January 7, which has been boycotted by its main opposition party, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP).
Supporters of Yunus, rights groups and activists have termed the verdict “politically motivated”. They blame the “unusual rush” to convict the renowned economist because he is perceived by the ruling Awami League party of PM Sheikh Hasina as a political rival.
“The conviction of Yunus is emblematic of the beleaguered state of human rights in Bangladesh, where the authorities have eroded freedoms and bulldozed critics into submission,” Amnesty International said, reacting to the sentencing of Muhammad Yunus on Monday.
Lawyers who fought for Yunus called the Grameen Telecom case “meritless, false and ill-motivated”. They said it was aimed to “harass and humiliate him before the global community”.
British business tycoon Richard Branson called it “A real miscarriage of justice, a politically motivated prosecution by a government determined to destroy Yunus and his legacy”. American lawyer and rights activist Kerry Kennedy called it "yet another example of the [Bangladesh] government's vendetta against its critics".
Not everyone, however, thinks this to be a politically motivated case.
"There is absolutely no politics in this court ruling and the government has nothing to do with it. This case was filed by workers of Grameen Telecom. The government doesn't have any role to play in it," Muntassir Mamoon, Bangabandhu Chair of Chittagong University, tells IndiaToday.In.
UNUSUAL RUSH TO CONVICT MUHAMMAD YUNUS?
Muhammad Yunus and his microcredit organisation Grameen Bank won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for their anti-poverty campaign.
He is considered to be a powerful force in a country that has seen extended periods of political flux and which is headed for elections on January 7 without its main opposition party, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP).
Though some say that the prosecution and sentencing of Yunus was a purely legal process and the law took its course, Bangladesh watchers see it as part of a vilification drive against the Nobel laureate.
Professor Asif Nazrul of the law department of Dhaka University tells IndiaToday.In that Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus has been facing a relentless campaign launched by the Sheikh Hasina government for over a decade now. “There is a continuous attempt at character assassination and the abuses Dr Yunus has been facing are of the extreme level,” he says.
How could it be a case of political victimisation, as claimed by activists and the supporters of Muhammad Yunus, because the Nobel laureate has been convicted by a court of law?
Professor Asif Nazrul explains that the regime in Bangladesh has a tight grip over the judiciary. “Former Chief Justice of Bangladesh, SK Sinha, was ousted from the country for some anti-government verdicts. We have to see the Yunus sentencing from that angle,” he says.
Both the professor of law and Amnesty International pointed out the “unusual rush” to convict and sentence Muhammad Yunus. They questioned the “speed of trial” in the Yunus case.
Labour law cases otherwise move very slowly in Bangladesh. Even the Rana Plaza and the Tazreen Fashion cases, both of which gained international attention for the scale of deaths, are stuck in legal corridors, experts said. While over 1,000 people were killed in the Rana Plaza building collapse in 2013, 117 people died in the Tazreen Fashion inferno of 2012.
“Even in the cases where hundreds have been killed in factory fires, the owners are facing very few cases. But there are over 200 cases against Dr Yunus,” says Asif Nazrul.
Muntassir Mamoon doesn't see any rush in the Grameen Telecom case and says proceedings have been going on for a year now. He also cites the earlier cases in which Yunus got relief from higher courts.
WHY AWAMI LEAGUE CONSIDERS MUHAMMAD YUNUS A RIVAL
Why is Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her government being vindictive as is being alleged?
“Muhammad Yunus was viewed by the Awami League regime as part of the 1/11 depoliticisation process,” explains Asif Nazrul.
‘One-Eleven’ refers to the process initiated on January 11, 2007, by which a military-backed caretaker government assumed charge in Bangladesh on the eve of the general election. For two years, it tried to work on what is referred to as the ‘Minus-Two formula’, getting rid of the top two political players -- Sheikh Hasina of the Awami League and Khaleda Zia of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP).
Muhammad Yunus is said to have been the prime choice for the prime minister’s job of the ‘Minus-Two’ participants. What has to be noted is that Yunus was offered the position of the chief advisor to the caretaker government, a role he didn’t accept.
In 2007, Yunus planned to float a political party and held public meetings but ultimately didn’t end up doing so.
Sheikh Hasina was placed under arrest and given the option to either leave the country or stay in prison. She chose to stay back. In the election that took place in 2008, she formed the government.
“Another reason believed to be behind the targeting of Muhammad Yunus by the Sheikh Hasina government is the charge that he was behind the cancellation of the World Bank funds for the Padma River bridge project,” says Professor Nazrul. He says the accusations were “ludicrous and could never be proved”.
Muntassir Mamoon, however, doesn't deny that the Awami League government reacts politically to Muhammad Yunus, a reference to the Nobel laureate's bid to launch a party during 'One-Eleven' and his political stance.
"The political reaction of the Awami League government is not because of his work as an economist or founder of Grameen Bank, it is a reaction to the political attitude of Yunus," says Mamoon.
The Hasina government started a series of investigations against Yunus and his organisations, including Grameen Bank, after coming to power in 2008.
In August 2023, 176 Nobel laureates and world leaders, including ex-US President Barack Obama, wrote a letter to the Hasina government over the “continuous judicial harassment” of Muhammad Yunus. They requested that cases against him be withdrawn.
Muntassir Mamoon says the image that Yunus pulled millions out of poverty is a false picture painted by western media. "On the ground in Bangladesh, there is no such feeling for Yunus."
Sheikh Hasina has called Yunus a “bloodsucker" and accused him of using force to recover loans from poor rural women as head of Grameen Bank.
The Grameen Telecom case against Muhammad Yunus might be a plain labour law case filed by workers, but that it is being perceived as part of a "witch hunt" says a lot about the political situation in Bangladesh.
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