Upazila chairmen and vice-chairmen on Saturday gave the government until November 30 to make the upazila parishads functional, or they threatened to take to the streets.
Leaders of the Bangladesh Upazila Parishad Association, Bangladesh Chairman-Vice-Chairman Oikya Parishad, Bangladesh Vice-Chairman Samanway Parishad and Bangladesh Upazila Vice-Chairman Parishad at a joint press conference in the city announced the deadline to press home their demands that included placing all employees and officials of different departments at the upazila level under their authority.
‘Upazila parishads have been non-functional since the elections to the local government bodies were held in January 2009…We want the upazila parishads to function under the full control of the elected representatives as per the constitutional provision,’ president of the Bangladesh Upazila Parishad Association Harun-ur-Rashid Hawlader said in a written statement.
He said bureaucrats did not want the local administration to come under the elected representatives and the officials made accountable to the public.
The local representatives under different banners have been rallying for taking over the local administration, now virtually run by the upazila nirbahi officers, for the last 20 months.
They said local officials of all 13 departments, including the UNOs, should work under the authority of the upazila chairman as per the law in order to strengthen the democratic system.
A total of 1,443 chairmen and vice-chairmen would hold a rally in the capital by November 30 after separate meetings in seven divisions to mobilise public support for an effective local government system, said Harun-ur Rashid, also chairman of Dumki upazila in Patuakhali.
He said that they would announce the next programmes in details from a scheduled meeting in Dhaka on October 9. ‘We will enforce tough programmes if our demands are not accepted by the deadline.’
General secretary of the Bangladesh Upazila Parishad Association Badiuzzaman said the civil bureaucracy had made the upazila parishad dysfunctional by issuing gazette notifications at times although the system was reintroduced after 18 years by a political government.
He alleged that upazila nirbahi officers in many areas were involved in extortion and were trying to tarnish the image of the government in collusion with some deputy commissioners.
Badiuzzaman, chairman of Nalitabari upazila in Sherpur, said the upazila chairmen wanted that all UNOs, belonging to the 22nd batch of the Bangladesh Civil Service and recruited during the previous BNP-led government, should be withdrawn from the field. ‘These officers are trying to tarnish the image of the government,’ he alleged.
Convener of Bangladesh Chairman-Vice-Chairman Oikya Parishad Abdul Mazid said that the upazila parishads at present did not have any work to do as all responsibilities were being carried out by the UNOs.
He called upon the lawmakers across the country to give voice to their demand in the parliament to make the local government system functional.
