Municipalities depend on ministry
Say mayors at convention
Though the government speaks of strengthening local government bodies, mayors of the country's 311 municipalities have to largely depend on the ministry concerned for their development activities.
At a convention of Municipality Association of Bangladesh (MAB), the mayors also said the LGRD ministry is yet to formulate any rules even after two and a half years of the passage of the local government (municipality) act, 2009.
“I even had to write to the secretary of the ministry [LGRD] to get permission to sell a tree in my area that fall down ten months back on a stormy day,” said Mahbubur Rahman, mayor of Bogra municipality.
At the convention, many mayors like Mahbubur shared their bad experience on implementation of development activities.
Around 300 mayors and 200 councilors took part in the daylong event organised by MAB at the LGED auditorium.
“It was the ministry's job to formulate a monetary allocation policy through which the ministry will allocate fund to municipalities. But they are yet to formulate it,” Shamim Al Razi, secretary general of MAB, also mayor of Singra municipality, told The Daily Star.
He said in absence of a policy, the government often acts partisan, while allocating funds and aids to his municipality.
Abu Yusuf Chowdhury, mayor of Matiranga municipality, said he often gets less amount of fund from the ministry as he supports the opposition party.
Speaking at the convention, Ajmat Ullah Khan, president of MAB, said there are some sections in the municipality law which is contradictory to the constitution.
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel.
Comments