Govt to lose popularity if it fails to stop the plunderers: Menon

25 October 2009, 17:00 PM

Our Correspondent, Rangpur

Workers Party President lawmaker Rashed Khan Menon yesterday said the government will be isolated from the people if it fails to check corruption and restore good governance in all sectors. “Corruption breeds poverty and poverty breeds terrorism and fundamentalism. If the government fails to resist corruption in all sectors right now, poverty will rise and the fundamentalist forces will employ the poor for terrorist activities in the name of establishing Islamic rule in the country,” he said. Addressing the 8th district unit council meeting of Workers Party at Rangpur town hall yesterday afternoon, Menon said, "The government sanctioned money under several programmes for alleviation of poverty and monga but the local Awami League leaders misappropriated it as the leaders of BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami did during their tenure." “People voted for the grand alliance against BNP-led four-party alliance in the last election to see a corruption-free country. But the people as well as the leaders and activists of Workers Party are becoming frustrated as the AL leaders and activists are doing corruption across the country to plunder people's resources. "Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina earlier said that Awami League will not export gas without keeping its reserve for fifty years for the country but she is going to sign an agreement with provision to export gas. "National Committee for Protection of Oil, Gas, Mineral Resources and Maritime Port as well as the left-leaning political parties are protesting steps to lease gas fields to the foreign companies but the government did not pay heed to their words. I will place a bill about it in parliament," he said. Appreciating the government's step to sit with its Indian counterpart to settle a treaty about sharing water of the Teesta River, he urged the government to be cautious about the interest of Bangladesh in this regard. Among others, Central Committee Member Nazrul Islam Hokkani and Abdur Razzak spoke in the meeting presided over by Mazerul Islam.