Hillary Clinton, the former US Secretary of State and First Lady, recently voiced her support for Dr. Muhammad Yunus on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter. Clinton known for his divisive characteristics in US politics, joined the call with 176 signatories who called Bangladesh Prime Minister to withdraw private judicial cases against Dr. Yunus.
Her tweet said, “Stand with me and more than 160 other global leaders to support great humanitarian and Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus in his moment of need. Join the movement to demand an end to his persecution. #protectyunus”
The remarkable revelation is that out of these 105 individuals who signed the letter supporting Yunus, 64 are Nobel laureates who achieved their accolades while under Democratic governance. In simpler terms, 61% of the Nobel Prize recipients among the signatories received their awards during Democratic rules when President Bill Clinton was in office or Hillary served as the Secretary of State.
You Can Also Read: Why Dr. Yunus had to pay Tk12 crores tax?
Dr. Muhammad Yunus who won a Nobel Peace Prize is facing legal consequences due to labor rights violations and involvement in financial misconduct, including money laundering. Clinton’s tweet generated a significant backlash in the comment section, most of whom were from verified Twitter accounts.
How did Twitter verse react?
The comment section of the tweet generated a significant number of negative reactions. Here are some for our audience to read.
Hillary Clinton and Dr. Yunus’ controversial relationship
The Grameen Bank founder is known to be a close family friend of the Clintons. There are photographs of them together which portrays a close bond.
There are media reports that suggest that they have a financial transactional relationship as well. Although not illegal in the United States, there are ethical dilemmas of their nature.
The Daily Caller News Foundation, headquartered in Washington, has reported that its inquiry discovered that the tax funds were provided to Yunus through 18 distinct transactions of USAID awards, as indicated on the USAspending.gov website for federal contracts when Hilary Clinton was Secretary of State. The USAID granted awards amounting to $13 million, starting during Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state. Additionally, the report indicates that organizations aligned with Yunus received an additional $11 million in federal funds.
Emails made public from Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state also indicated that Yunus had repeatedly appealed to her to leverage her authority over the Bangladesh government, aiming to tilt its stance in his favor. Yunus was confronting a legal dispute regarding his continued role as the Managing Director of Grameen Bank, even though he had exceeded the permissible age limit. He was later withdrawn from the post when the Bangladesh Supreme Court dismissed his claims.
In 2016, it was reported by BBC Bangla and Daily Prothom Alo that, Yunus donated up to $50,000 to Clinton Foundation, an institute run by the Clinton Family. The Daily Caller News Foundation investigation says that the amount reaches somewhere from $1,00,00 to $3,00,000 citing the Clinton Foundation website.
Based on information from the State Department, out of the 154 individuals who had personal meetings or phone conversations with Hillary Clinton during her time in office, 85 of them contributed to their family foundations. The cumulative value of their donations reached a sum of $156 million.
Why is Yunus facing legal action?
Recently, the Anti-Corruption Commission of Bangladesh, DUDOK initiated an investigation against Grameen Telecom (GT) and its management board in a money laundering case involving TK3,000 crore. The allegations include misappropriation of 5% reserved benefits for employees, unauthorized deductions of 6% from lawyers’ fees and workers’ salaries as other charges, embezzlement of more than TK45.52 crore from employees’ welfare funds, and illegal transfer of TK2,977 crore from the company.
The list of allegations against Dr. Yunus’ organization is not new. On September 9, 2021, a case was filed against Dr. Yunus and three others under sections 4, 7, 8, 117, and 234 of the Labor Act by the Department of Factory and Establishment Inspection for violating labor laws. They were formally accused of violating the country’s labor laws for their established social business organization. Dr. Yunus publicly apologized for the violation and acknowledged that his established social business organization had indeed breached the labor law.
Additionally, recently a significant allegation has emerged against Dr. Yunus, where he has been accused of unlawfully settling 110 cases of labor union and employee complaints against Grameen Telecom for TK250 million. In 2015, he was also embroiled in controversy when the National Board of Revenue (NBR) of Bangladesh called upon Dr. Yunus for paying unpaid taxes accounting for over USD1.51 million.