JS Body Chief on MPs
<i>It's as if they take country's lease for five years </i>
Public representatives think they take lease of the country for five years to do whatever they want, said ruling Awami League lawmaker AKM Mozammel Huq yesterday.
“After forming the government, they think…I am a lessee. No one can question me. If anyone does so, we merely remind them that it is they who voted us for five years,” he said
Mozammel was addressing a discussion titled “Poor People's Right to Access in Commons Wealth: Duty of state and institution” in the city's Cirdap auditorium, organised by Campaign for Sustainable Rural Livelihood (CSRL), Oxfam and Grow.
Public representatives can not overcome this “lessee” attitude and do not see that they are to act only as the manager of people's welfare. If they cannot do so, people could sack them, he said.
“Suppose if 50 percent of the budget is spent for the lawmakers, Tk 80,000 crore remains. If the government spent Tk 1,000 crore in developing every district, the picture would have changed.
“But nothing changed,” said Mozammel.
Mozammel, also chairman of the parliamentarian body on land ministry, at the beginning of his address, said he was criticising the government as a citizen, not as a party leader or a lawmaker.
He blamed the government for the dysfunctional state of local government bodies, not materialising the electoral manifesto, poor implementation of the national budget and weaknesses in Wetland Management Policy, revised in 2009.
Ponds are termed as wetlands in the policy for which none was leased out in the last three years. The government made a mess of the policy while trying to make it more effective, added Mozammel.
He opined that the local government should be empowered to ensure access of poor people in common resources such as khas lands and wetlands.
Speaking at the discussion, economists MM Akash pointed out eight ways to facilitate access of poor fishermen to common resources including their empowerment and co-operation with the state and aid by social entrepreneurs.
Fishermen who are actually financially insolvent are not benefiting from the policy. Rather it is the middlemen or rich people who are enjoying it. Political goodwill is needed to address the 40-year-old problems related to the resources, said speakers at the discussion.
Oxfam BD Program Policy Officer Dr AKM Nazrul Islam presented a written paper at the programme, moderated by Citizens Solidarity General Secretary Sharifuzzaman Sharif.
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