The government moves to give immunity to the World Bank will be a free license to commit mass destruction in the name of development. In 1972 and 1973 The IMF and ADB were given immunity and the World Bank was then given partially. Now the BNP-Jamat led coalition attempts to complete the process! Why does the government take such move? Why does the government want to hide the ugly face of World Bank?

Around world the World Bank, IMF and ADB, the leading trio of money lending agency, imposed neoliberal economic policy (privatization, deregulation of state, cutting public expenditure for social service, etc.) upon the third world countries in the name of poverty reduction, good governance and sustainable development. But their much suggested (read imposed) economic policy does not get any good for the people. But it caused enormous sufferings. The World Bank Structural Adjustment Policy (SAP) sharpened the gap between the rich and the poor. A recent survey suggested that, in Bangladesh, the gap between rich and poor have been widened during last six years. Poverty Monitoring Survey Report of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BSS) revealed that the rich household income have increased of 13.36 percent while the poor found it decreasing by 3.56 percent (The Daily Star on May 15, 2005)

World Bank like IMF and ADB create pressure upon the third world governments to curb corruption, enhance rule of law, improve human rights situation. There is an endemic corruption in Bangladesh, almost everywhere and every sector. Common people are the most sufferers. But the corporate institutions like World Bank et all are primarily responsible for these sufferings. These are the institution that are promoting corruption and violates human rights all over the third world countries. Executive director of Focus on the Global South, Walden Bello rightly points out:

For the greater part of the last 30 years, the Fund and the Bank have been intimately associated with very corrupt governments and human rights violators. What did the Brazilian military dictatorship, Ferdinand Marcos, Gen. Pinochet, the PRI government in Mexico, and the Suharto regime have in common? They were all governments or heads of governments that were designated by the World Bank as “countries of concentration”; that is, countries to which the flow of Bank resources was greater than to other countries of similar size and income. (IMF/WB/WTO: Evil Dictators or Helpless Slaves? by Walden Bello)

Economist Anu Mohammad makes the issue clearer:

Corruption is huge in Bangladesh, but that is why the Bank find here very strong support base. How can institutions like this [ IMF, World Bank] survive without the life support of corrupts? How can otherwise the projects World Bank pursues be endorsed? (Crime and Reward: Immunity To The World Bank by Anu Muhammad)

The International Financial Organisations Order (Amendment) Act 2004 proposed by the Jamat-BNP led coalition says:

The Bank shall enjoy immunity from every form of legal process…no action shall be brought against the Bank, by any agency, or by any entity or person, and there shall be recourse to such special procedures for the settlement of controversies between the Bank and the government or the agency or entity or person as the case may be…. Property and assets of the Bank shall whosesoever located and by whomsoever held be immune from all forms of seizure, attachment or execution, before the delivery of final judgment against the Bank.

…no action shall be brought against the Bank, by any agency, or by any entity or person whatever they do against the people of Bangladesh! But why does the World Bank seek such immunity? Anu Mohammad further noted:

A coalition is there which smells trouble in the air. World Bank along with other agencies, local policymakers i.e., ministers, bureaucrats, consultants, commission agents are the honorable members of the coalition. It seems that all of those need to keep all things away from any public scrutiny; they need to seal for ever the possibility of opening the Pandora’s Box to show the ugly faces! (Crime and Reward: Immunity To The World Bank by Anu Muhammad)

Thus, this bill goes against peoples right and undermines democratic values. But peoples around the world raise their voice against the corporate monsters and their atrocities, and resistance movement goes on also in Bangladesh. They can get immunity from their `local goon’, but they can’t hide their ugly face and crime against humanity forever. Resistance goes on…

The author is an anti-imperialist activist, working with a little magazine Baak. The Author will welcome comments on the topic. email: [email protected]

---