Immediate suspension over municipal waste failures: State minister
Photo: Agamir Somoy
State Minister of Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperatives Mir Shahe Alam said if municipal waste management and citizen services are disrupted, the officials will be immediately suspended.
He added that departmental and administrative action will be taken against those in charge of municipalities that fail to ensure modern waste management and environment-friendly initiatives.
The state minister made these remarks while speaking as the chief guest at a national workshop organized at LGED Bhaban in Agargaon, Dhaka on Wednesday.
Mir Shahe said, “Although waste management is one of the main tasks of a city, most municipalities do not have any specific landfill. Keeping waste in open spaces hampers the objective of the master plan and puts public health at risk. Modern landfills with manholes and boundary walls must be constructed quickly so that electricity and fertilizer can be produced from waste using modern technology.
“The government organized this workshop by spending a large sum of money. Yet, out of 61 municipalities, 17 administrators and 19 municipal executive officers are absent. Such indifference from those in charge calls into question the main goal and objective of the seminar.” However, praising the presence of engineers, he termed it as positive.
He added, “Although the master plan of the municipality is extremely important, major irregularities occurred in the list in the past due to political influence. As a result, many important and deserving municipalities were deprived of the benefits of the master plan. Essentially, district-based and Class-A municipalities should have been prioritized in this list right at the beginning.”
The state minister noted that ongoing development projects worth Tk 1,20,000 crore are underway across the country through LGED for infrastructure development under the Local Government Division. He instructed officials to emphasize creating roads as well as children’s parks, graveyards, safe drinking water supply, conservation of canals and water bodies, and extensive tree plantation.
Giving a zero-tolerance message regarding administrative harassment in birth and death registration and citizen services, the state minister said allegations have been received against some municipalities of taking unethical benefits from citizens by intentionally suspending services or through corruption. These will not be tolerated under any circumstances. Action will be taken against municipalities that leave allocations sent for solar panels unused.
Highlighting social protection projects undertaken by the government, he added that family cards will be handed over to the female heads of four crore families within the next four years for the economic empowerment of women. This year itself, 41 lakh women will come under this benefit with an allocation of Tk 13,000 crore. In addition, he called for including training to learn Arabic, Malay, Korean, or Japanese as a third language alongside English to create employment through skill development for disadvantaged youth.
Alongside this, he mentioned bringing the heads of over 3.5 lakh religious institutions under state honorarium and allocating Tk 30 lakh for each union to renovate religious places of worship.
Senior officials of the Local Government Division, additional chief and executive engineers of LGED, faculty members of Urban and Rural Planning departments of various universities, and administrators, chief executive officers, and engineers of various municipalities were present at the workshop.
