Staff Reporter:
Lord Mark Malloch-Brown, an adviser of the IMF and World Bank and a former head of UNDP, yester-day called on Bangladesh Chief Adviser Professor Muhammad Yunus at the State Guest House Jamuna in Dhaka.
He thanked Prof Yunus for assuming the leadership of the Interim Government at a very crucial time in Bangladesh’s history, especially at a time when expectations were high.
The former British minister also said he would be happy to extend his help for the cause of the Bangla-deshi people.
The hour-long talks covered wide-ranging issues, including the mass uprising in July-August, develop-ment issues, the Interim Government’s reform initiatives, the misinformation campaign targeting the stu-dent-led movement, healthcare, social business, and microcredit.
Prof Yunus thanked Lord Malloch-Brown for supporting Bangladesh. He said managing expectations is one of the key challenges of the government.
The Chief Adviser said reform was the key word of the July-August student-led mass uprising, and his government is committed to carrying out major reforms before holding a free and fair election.
He said the Interim Government would act as a facilitator of the reform process and has set up 15 reform commissions so far to fix key institutions left broken by the dictatorship of Sheikh Hasina.
Dr. Martha Chen, a development worker; Asif Saleh, the Executive Director of Brac, and Lamiya Morshed, senior secretary of the Bangladesh Government, were present in the meeting.
