Even though water resources minister Anisul Islam Mahmud of the Jatiya Party (JP) has already submitted his resignation letter to his party chairman, he suddenly visited his office at the Secretariat at 12.30pm on Monday. This has exacerbated the confusion over the status of the JP ministers in the Cabinet. When officials of the ministry learnt that their minister had come to office, they went and met him. The minister’s private secretary (PS) also went to the minister’s room. The minister said, “Please ask the authorities to pay my salary and other benefits to my bank account. Bring the office files for my signature.”
On receiving the minister’s instructions, PS to the minister, Md Mizanur Rahman, sent a letter (no. 206 dated December 22, 2013) to the Cabinet Division mentioning the minister’s bank account number, seeking payment of his salary and other facilities.
In the letter, Anisul Islam Mahmud provided his specimen signatures and also mentioned his residential address. He stayed in office for only a couple of hours, leaving at 2.30pm.
Md Mizanur Rahman could not say whether the minister would attend office on Tuesday or not.
Along with five of his party’s leaders, who had taken oath as ministers and state ministers on November 18, Anisul Islam Mahmud had also decided not to join the 10th Parliamentary election amid a boycott by major parties.
All of them had submitted their resignations to their party chief and had claimed that the letters were sent by post.
However, the Cabinet division has not received the resignation letters of the Jatiya Party ministers till date. Their names are still there in the list of ministers of the Cabinet division.
Talking to this correspondent, another Jatiya Party leader Salma Islam, who is the state minister for women and children’s affairs, stated that she has signed some files, though she did not go to her Secretariat office in the last few days.
State minister for youth and sports, Mujibul Haque Chunnu, said he will not go to his Secretariat office till the date of the election, January 5, as he will leave Dhaka for his constituency Kishoreganj on Tuesday for contesting the poll.
Sources in the six ministries said a number of important files has not been cleared because six ministers and state ministers are absent from their respective Secretariat offices.
At a recent meeting, secretaries of six ministries — civil aviation, water resources, health, commerce, women and children’s affairs, and youth and sports — expressed frustration over the situation. They requested the Cabinet secretary to find a solution as soon as possible to keep the government running, the sources added.
The secretaries also informed the Cabinet secretary that a number of important files has not been cleared because six ministers and state ministers are absent.
On November 18, a 29-member poll-time government headed by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was formed. Leaders of the Jatiya Party — Ruhul Amin Hawlader, Rawshan Ershad, Anisul Islam Mahmud, GM Quader, Mujibul Huq Chunnu and Salma Islam — were appointed to the ministry.
Courtesy of The Independent
