Editorial
Transport sector under extortionists' grip
Break the unholy nexus
The head of the three-member parliamentary subcommittee, tasked to find ways to check corruption in the transport sector, has opened up a can of worms. It should alarm anyone to read the way the sector has come under the vice of a disgusting practice that not only has deleterious impact on the sector itself, it has an equally negative impact on the country's economy.
The report that appeared in this newspaper recently, quoting the head of the subcommittee, is stunning though not new. The media in general in Bangladesh have been revealing from time to time the bizarre situation obtaining in this sector, without any consequence. And one wonders whether the government can really take any meaningful action given the odious linkage between the lawmakers, law keepers, the transport owners, and the workers' leaders some of whom are also lawmakers.
It is mind boggling to read the degree of the extortion regime, even more so when one finds that a minister has been named as one of those that are involved in it. Going by the same report, only three of the transport workers' federations, including the one led by the said minister, earn more than 130 crore a year ostensibly for welfare of the transport workers. And if this causes rise in fares from between 40 and 200 percent, one can well imagine the impact it will have on other areas. It is the people that have to bear the brunt of a practice that has assumed criminal proportions.
We hope, now that the degree and the extent of the problem, severely compounded by the political control that encumbers the sector, have been exposed once again, this time by the parliamentary standing committee, the government would be motivated enough to act to correct the situation.
We cannot condemn enough this practice, and cannot agree more with those that feel that this will not stop unless the police and political leaders are held in check. The task before the government is very clear. Is the government up to it?
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