Tuesday, September 10, 2024
Year : 2, Issue: 36
Dhaka Desk: US Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin has expressed his support for Chief Adviser Prof Muhammad Yunus and urged US President Joe Biden to support him as well.
“I’m going to offer my full support to him today. I believe in him. I did 20 years ago, and I do today. I urge President Biden to support him as well. I know Dr Yunus has the best interests of the Bangladeshi people at heart and will do his utmost in this challenging time,” Durbin, a Democratic senator from Illinois, said at the Senate floor yesterday.
He detailed Nobel Laureate Yunus’ life-long work of developing microloan programmes that allow low-income families in developing countries make a living, while also adding how he faced the wrath of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, according to a statement by Durbin. Durbin began his remarks by recalling his first trip to Bangladesh, when he first met Prof Yunus.
“During the course of that trip, I was introduced to an economics professor [Dr Yunus] at the university. He was an interesting character. He had come up with a theory that he thought would help the poorest people on Earth.
“He was sometimes known as the ‘Banker to the Poor’ after he received the Nobel Prize. He pioneered microlending as a groundbreaking method of helping some of the world’s poorest people. He recognised that with just a little bit of money in hand, many people could lift themselves out of poverty,” Durbin said.
Durbin said because of the success of many microcredit programs, which have allowed more than 140 million people on five continents to receive microloans, Dr Yunus was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006.
“I called him on the phone when I heard his good fortune. He was upbeat and believes that the people of that country are prepared now to rise to this historic opportunity.”
