Govt eyes majority stake with new law
The government plans to turn the Grameen Bank ordinance into a law to gain a controlling stake in the microcredit organisation.
A draft of the Grameen Bank Act 2013 has been sent to the finance ministry, a government official said.
The government wants to acquire the majority share -- at least 51 percent -- to have an influence over the organisation.
It formed the Grameen Bank Inquiry Commission in September last year to review the operation of GB and 48 other legally independent organisations founded by Nobel Laureate Prof Muhammad Yunus and to make recommendations about their future structures.
The commission plans to recommend bringing changes to the legal structure of Grameen Bank, which will allow the government to raise its share to at least 51 percent from 25 percent as mentioned in the Grameen Bank Ordinance 1983. The government is waiting for the commission's final report before finalising the draft law.
It says it has decided to transform the GB ordinance into a law along with other ordinances promulgated between 1982 and 1986 by a military government to prevent those from becoming void in line with a court order.
According to the draft, GB's paid-up capital will be raised to Tk 300 crore from the current Tk 60 crore.
The paid-up capital was raised to Tk 300 crore during the rule of the caretaker government in 2008 but the Awami League-led government did not sign it into a law after assuming power in 2009.
The commission told the finance ministry that there was no need to raise the paid-up capital since the ordinance, issued in 2008, was not made into a law, sources said.
The finance ministry said it had injected Tk 13.2 crore into GB to raise the government's stake to 25 percent, which dropped to 3.29 percent as the government did not pay against its share in the paid-up capital.
The government-sponsored commission is set to hold a seminar of experts in Dhaka on July 2, in which ideas of changing the legal structure of GB would dominate the agenda.
The commission is however tight-lipped about the experts to be invited for the workshop.
Meanwhile, the commission's recommendations have drawn strong criticism from nine elected borrower directors of GB, independent observers and anti-poverty campaigners.
The nine directors, who constitute the majority in the 12-member Grameen Bank board, rejected the suggestions.
A number of respected experts say the government has taken the step only to destroy the microcredit organisation.
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