Transparency, accountability in aid disbursement demanded

Some 21 civil society organizations staged a protest rally on Tuesday to denounce the role of the development partners and their allied ‘elite class’ and bureaucrats in development process, saying they were responsible for misusing foreign aid.

They [the development partners in Bangladesh, the ‘elite class’ and the bureaucrats] have made the country increasingly indebted since liberation, the protesters from rights based organizations told the rally.

Bangladesh government on Monday began a two-day dialogue in Dhaka with multilateral lenders and donor countries seeking approval of the poverty reduction strategy, a lender-driven development document.

Parallel to the ongoing BDF meeting, the rights organizations — Arpan, AMKS, Eso, Bangladesh Krishak Federation, CSRL, EquityBD, Kishani Sohva, Lead Trust, On line knowledge centre, Protikrit, Karmajibi Nari, La via campesina, MFTD, Prantik, Purbasha, RCSV, Swadhin Bangla Garments Sramik Federation, Solidarity Workshop, Sirajganj Flood Forum, Uddipan, Voice, and World Development Movement, UK—organised the rally in front of National Press Club in the city.

The organizers demanded sovereign, democratic and responsible financing to ensure that the benefits of aid and loans reach the poor through a transparent and accountable manner.

In a written statement, the organizers mentioned that Bangladesh has the right to have development aid, but a lion’s share of foreign aid is misused and repatriated to the aid providing countries in the form consultancy and technical assistance fees.

A study, conducted by economist Abul Barkat, reveals that 30 per cent of the aid goes back to the donor country, 25 per cent goes to the bureaucrats, 25 per cent goes to the local elites and politicians and only 20 per cent reaches the poor.
Such a misuse has been taking place for unexpected control of the financing by the donors and their allied bureaucrats, the rally was told.

They proposed that all aid and loan money have to be discussed and approved in parliament while at present there is no such an obligation in the constitution.
They suggested that all loan and aid agreements have to be transparent and accessible by mass public, but no such provision is there in the recently passed Right to Information Act.

They also proposed for formation of a separate audit commission to audit foreign aid and loan projects and all audit reports on foreign aid and loan projects have to be made public by Comptroller and Auditor General’s Office.

‘During implementation of foreign aided projects at local levels, participation of the stakeholders and local government representatives and civil society organizations should be ensured,’ they said in their statement.
The statement said that there should be a legal limit of receiving loans both from foreign and domestic sources, as in no way it should hinder investment in essential services sectors like health and education.

Mustafa Kamal Akanda of EquityBD, Babdurl Alam of La Via Campesina, Feroza Ahmed from Lead Trust, Farzana Akhter from Voice, Saleha Begum from Kishani Sohva, SM Mamun of Karmajibi Nari, Abdul Kader Hazari of Arpan, Syed Aminul Haque, Md. Shamsuddoha and Rezaul K Chowdhury of EquityBD, among others, spoke at the rally.
Meanwhile in London, another rally was also organized in front of the office of British donor agency, Department for International Development, according to reports reaching here.

The rally was jointly organized by World Development Movement, Jubilee Debt Campaign UK, Friends of the Earth and Christian Aid.They were critical of the role of DFID as this organization is pressing Bangladesh government to allow World Bank to manage the multi-donor trust fund on climate change.

http://www.newagebd.com/2010/feb/17/nat.html