Bangladesh Protest World Bank Disbursement of UK DFID Aid
The Bangladeshi government is taking a strong stance against an influx of nearly U.S. $100 million for aid related to climate change from the U.K Department for International Development (DFID). At issue is the allocation scheme. DFID is passing along the money to Bangladesh through the World Bank, instead of allocating the aid bilaterally. The reason why there’s talk at all about this funding scheme is that the government of Bangladesh is concerned that the World Bank disbursement will have strings attached.
“We are strongly against the World Bank’s involvement in handling the climate fund. DFID should give the money straight to the Bangladesh government rather than giving it to the World Bank to disburse it,” Food and Disaster Management Minister Abdur Razzaque told IRIN on 16 February.
“It should be a country-led programme rather than a World Bank-led one,” he said, adding that there were expectations the Bank would attach “unacceptable strings and conditions to its programme”.
Bangladesh’s strong stance follows a public demonstration outside DFID office in Dhaka where 21 civil society organizations protested DFID’s move to disburse through the promised funds through the World Bank. There are two reasons at work here. One is the ultimate reason, the other the proximate one. The proximate reason is the one that is being presented, ostensibly as the source of contention. The Bangladesh government is protesting the conditions attached to the disbursement because those conditions can be thought of as challenges to Bangladeshi national sovereignty. That argument has legs. The ultimate reason for these protests however are that the Awami League government does not want to allow the BNP the all-powerful “weak on national sovereignty” argument. It is an argument that will be taken up gleefully by opposition partisans; already the AL has had a taste of that medicine. The BNP protested the AL’s accords with the Congress Party of India on the grounds that the AL had sold away Bangladesh’s rights to its own assets.
Both the World Bank and DFID stand together see nothing wrong with the disbursement and argue that the most important issue is that the money be used to combat the consequences of global –and local– climate change. That remains true, irrespective of the disbursement scheme. However the choice of this particular scheme, is based on two reasons, or so I would argue. The main reason that multilateral disbursement schemes are used is that the World Bank has the managerial experience to deal with these types of allocations. Moreover, the sitting British Labour Party is loathe to arm its own opposition with the message that during difficult times, the incumbent party gave away the farm to a corrupt country that misused hard-earned pounds sterling.
But no matter. The problems for Bangladesh remain , as for any low-lying country. As IRIN, the humanitarian news service funded by the U.N shows, “within the next 50 years, over 20 million people could be displaced and become “climate change refugees”, if sea and salinity levels rise in Bangladesh, according to the government’s 2009 Bangladesh Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan.”
“Speaking at the opening of a two-day Bangladesh development meeting on 15 February, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina called on donor countries to speed up delivery of promised funds to help mitigate the effects of climate change. “
“World leaders pledged $30 billion from 2010 to 2012 at the December climate change summit in Copenhagen to help least developed countries (LDCs) most vulnerable to climate change, particularly low-lying coastal countries like Bangladesh. “ IRIN published a good piece on the rough outlines of the complex funding arrangement for disbursement of these aid pledges. You can find that piece
here
