The 18 the session of the 9th parliament will start on Monday and with the main opposition’s announcement of returning to the parliament, the ensuing session is expected to be a vibrant one. The finance minister will place his 5th budget amounting to around TK 2.22 lakh crore on June 6 in this session. Dr Shirin Sharmin Chowdhury the first female speaker of the country starts her debut in presiding the House in this session.
Besides the national budget, the parliament is likely to pass a number of important bills in this session.
The Parliament Secretariat has taken all preparations for the budget session. Officials said a meeting of the business advisory committee will be held tomorrow to finalize the duration of the 18th session.
The meeting will be held at the parliament building at 4pm with Speaker Dr Shirin Sharmin Chowdhury in the chair.
Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chowdhury on Sunday said the opposition would be given enough scope to talk in the parliament.
She hoped that the opposition would stay in the parliament full-time during the current session.
She was talking to reporters at her residence at the Jatiya Jangsad Bhaban.
The speaker said the ruling party and the opposition would get equal importance.
She also said that she might consider accepting adjournment motion by the opposition members if they attend the budget session regularly.
“There are so many systems of accepting the adjournment motion. I request them (opposition) to join the parliament for the remaining time and I will consider their motions,” she said.
Asked whether she would accept the opposition’s adjournment motion for restoring the caretaker government system, the Speaker said let them join the session first. “There are so many ways to raise adjournment motions. I’ll consider when motions are raised.”
She said there is little scope to discuss any other issue in the budget session, but there is scope to summon another session of parliament for discussing other issues. “If necessary, the President can summon another session.”
When her attention was drawn to an earlier marathon speech of the opposition leader that lasted about two hours, the Speaker said the opposition leader will get priority and she will speak.
Meanwhile, it may be mentioned that the BNP has submitted an adjournment motion in Parliament for revival of the caretaker government system, though it has repeatedly ignored government calls to place a proposal there on election.
Noakhali-1 MP AM Mahbub Uddin Khokon put forward the motion at the Parliament Secretariat on May 22.
The BNP lawmakers have also submitted 24 notices to discuss several recent issues like ‘ban’ on gathering and rallies.
-With The Independent input
