Staff Correspondent
The main opposition in parliament, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, will not become involved in the government’s move to amend the constitution to create the post of the second deputy speaker.
‘The BNP will not be involved in the creation of an additional post of a deputy speaker,’ said senior BNP lawmaker Salauddin Quader Chowdhury on Monday.
He said Awami League chief Sheikh Hasina had, before the parliamentary elections, promised if her party would go to power, the post of the deputy speaker would go to the opposition. ‘But this did not happen when the parliament elected the new speaker and the deputy speaker.’
The parliament, in its first session on Sunday, elected Awami League leaders Abdul Hamid the speaker and Shawkat Ali the deputy speaker.
Asked about the government’s plan to amend the constitution to create the post of the second deputy speaker, he said, ‘We are no longer interested in the post.’
The speaker, Abdul Hamid, on Monday said the government would soon place a bill in the parliament seeking a constitutional amendment to elect another deputy speaker from the opposition.
‘I am saying again that another deputy speaker will be elected from the opposition as soon as an amendment to the constitution is made,’ the speaker told reporters after placing a floral wreath before the mural of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, leader of the county’s independence movement.
He said the two deputy speakers would enjoy the same authority in the parliament.
In reply to a question, Hamid said the opposition should have proposed a name for the deputy speaker’s post in the first session of the ninth parliament.
‘If they had done that, we would have withdrawn our candidate for the deputy speaker,’ he claimed. ‘We cannot do anything at the moment as the constitution clearly says only one deputy speaker will be elected.’
When he was asked whether the ruling party had formally communicated with the opposition, the chief whip, Abdus Shahid, earlier said there had been some technical difficulty as the BNP had not elected its deputy leader or the chief whip before the parliament went into session.
After a landslide victory in the general elections, the Awami League
chief, Sheikh Hasina, at a briefing on December 31, 2008 offered the post of deputy speaker to the opposition.
The BNP’s vice-chairman MK Anwar MP said the ruling Awami League had not offered them the post of the deputy speaker.
Courtesy: newagebd.com
