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Communications ministry andits long list of predicaments

September 07, 2011 00:00:00


Shamsul Huq Zahid The Ministry of Communications and the man at its helm have been in the media spotlight (negative) for quite sometime. Their predicament started with the tragic death of two renowned media personalities -- filmmaker Tareque Masud and ATN News chief executive Mishuk Munier on August 13 last on Dhaka-Aricha highway. It peaked when the bus owners stopped plying their vehicles due to bad road conditions only a couple of weeks before the holy Eid-ul-fitr. Passenger bus operators on a few other inter-district routes followed suit on similar ground. Both took quite a pounding from the media, civil society members and the opposition politicians. What was worse, they came under fire from a few senior lawmakers of the ruling alliance, known as 'Mahajote'. Even a section of civil society members, who are known for their support to the ruling Awami League, organized a rally at the Central Shahid Minar on the Eid Day demanding the resignation of the communications minister. Undaunted by the scathing criticism and demand for his resignation, an always smiling communications minister while shifting the blame on to the Ministry of Finance for not releasing roads maintenance funds in time swung into action for making the road fit for movement of vehicles before Eid days. He did his job, more or less, successfully. Buses resumed operations days before the Eid festival. Thousands of people could go to and return from homes safely. Yet as if the 'Sani' (Saturn) has entered the zodiac sign of the communications minister, the whistleblower WikiLeaks has leaked a cable sent by the immediate past US Ambassador in Bangladesh James F Moriarty where he (ambassador) considered the communications minister 'less than honest'. That could be the personal observation made by the former US ambassador without having any solid documentary evidence to substantiate that. The minister has shrugged off Moriarty's observation claiming no wrongdoing. The latest on the list of predicaments is the news report about the World Bank's request to the Canadian authorities to investigate the allegations of corruption in a Canadian company's bid for supervision consultancy on the proposed $2.9 billion Padma Multipurpose Bridge, the longest one in the country. The company is among the firms short-listed for the consultancy job. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police have already raided the office of the company concerned and questioned its officials. The WB, which is very serious about making all the bidding for the Padma Bridge corruption-free, is also doing its own investigation into the alleged corruption by the Canadian company. The head of the Bangladesh Bridge Authority (BBA), the agency responsible for the implementation of the Padma Bridge project, ruled out any non-transparency in the bidding process, claiming that there was no scope for anyone, even the communications minister, to interfere in the bidding process. The people who came to know about a lot of the irregularities in the donor-financed Bangabandhu (Jamuna) Bridge by the courtesy of the media would expect that the claim made by the BBA chief was true. There is no denying that bidding process involving government projects, big or small, in a country like Bangladesh, in most cases, remain susceptible to interference by the powerful quarters and also to irregularities, financial or otherwise. The participants in the bids are also, at times, are found to be guilty of bribing the officials and powerful political quarters to secure contracts. And because of non-transparency, the unsuccessful bidders very often come out with allegations of different sorts. The WB's latest probe might have originated from similar allegations. Whatever could be the reasons behind launching the probe, every taxpayer should solidly back the multilateral lender's efforts to ensure graft-free implementation of the Padma Bridge. For, it is they and their next generation--- repayment period in the case of WB's $1.2 billion loan for Padma Bridge is 40 years--- would repay the loans along with interest. Zahidmar10@gmail.com

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