Archive for June 16th, 2008
Monday, June 16th, 2008The cabinet approved the Upazila Ordinance yesterday, giving full decision-making and implementation powers to upazila parishads while stripping members of the parliament (MP) of any role in local governance.The approval comes as the chief adviser meets around 300 former upazila parishad chairmen and members in the International Conference Centre today to discuss the upcoming local and general elections.The Upazila Ordinance 2008 also empowers the Election Commission (EC) with the authority to hold upazila elections.In line with other electoral reforms brought by the current government, the new Upazila Ordinance will bar individuals legally proven to be war criminals, persons with records ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008Detained BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia is likely to announce today her decision in response to a government proposal for submitting an application seeking her release, lawyers say.The former premier may make the announcement when she appears before the special court in connection with the Gatco case, the lawyers add.According to her counsels, Khaleda has no intention to get admitted into a city hospital, but she wants immediate release of her two sons for their treatment abroad.Sources say process to release Khaleda and her younger son Arafat Rahman Koko is at the final stage now, but the authorities have yet ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008Without caring at all for the government permission or maintaining environment codes, people are lifting rocks from vast patches of cultivable land in Panchagarh and some parts of Lalmonirhat and Nilphamari.Once arable, the pieces of land in the neighbourhoods of Tentulia turn uncultivable as the rock-lifters, who don't pay the government any revenue, abandon those.After extracting every available piece of rock, the lifters find it too expensive to fill up the pits, which contain only sand and oozing water and lie unused for years.Construction firms are encouraging the trade as these rocks are much cheaper than hard rocks due to ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008The government has started an initiative to free convicts, who have served half of their punishment, under special consideration since jails are overcrowded with inmates."Owing to accommodation problem in jails, we have directed deputy commissioners to send proposals after scrutinising who might be released," Home Secretary Abdul Karim told a press briefing at his ministry yesterday.He said earlier the government considered freeing those who have served two-thirds of their sentences.Bangladesh has the capacity to accommodate 27,386 inmates in jails across the country but as of May 28 the total number of inmates was 85,866.At the press conference, Home ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008The Election Commission (EC) is ready to promulgate today or tomorrow the code of conduct for candidates in city corporation and municipality elections, barring them from using their political affiliations in poll campaigns.The law ministry already okayed the provision, in defence of which the EC said since local government institutions are non-partisan, the candidates for those offices should not be allowed to use their political affiliations in election campaigns.The candidates will not be allowed to use the names and election symbols of the parties they are affiliated with, neither will they be allowed to use portraits of their party leaders. ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008Legal experts and human rights activists have strongly opposed the recently approved Anti-Terrorism Ordinance 2008 that provides death sentence as the maximum punishment or life imprisonment for an offender, their patrons and shelter providers.They expressed concern that the law may be exercised with a vindictive motive to politically harass and victimise innocent people.Protesting the death penalty provision, they said human rights activists in Bangladesh as elsewhere in the world do not support any provision for the capital punishment.The president promulgated the Anti-Terrorism Ordinance 2008 on June 11, providing death penalty for offences like terror financing and staging murder to create ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008Dhaka City Corporation yesterday unveiled Tk 1009.41 crore budget for the fiscal year 2008-09, without committing much to development programmes for the capital.It announced allocation for two new roads. But of those, construction of one is already underway. Its allocation for four new wholesale kitchen markets too is not new as it was in the budget for the outgoing year.Addressing a ceremony at Mahanagar Natya Mancha, Mayor Sadeque Hossain Khoka also declared that the city corporation would construct four graveyards, a pledge that he failed to make good last year.Though the city dwellers continue to suffer from mosquito bites, ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008The government has started implementing four gas distribution projects worth Tk 1,600 crore in the country's north and southwest even though availability of gas for the region is still uncertain, said senior officials at Petrobangla and the project directors.The energy and mineral resources ministry has already started working on three of the projects at a cost of Tk 903.22 crore and it will soon start the work of the fourth project named Southwest Gas Supply Project in Khulna with a Tk 700 crore price tag.Jalal Ahmed, chairman of Petrobangla, told The Daily Star over cell phone that gas crisis ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008The High Court (HC) yesterday issued a rule upon the government to explain as to why a number of the provisions for death penalty and disallowing bail in Emergency Powers Ordinance, 2007 and Emergency Power Rules, 2007 should not be declared illegal and unconstitutional.The rule came following the filing of a writ petition challenging the legality of some provisions of Emergency Powers Ordinance, 2007 and Emergency Power Rules, 2007 saying that those deny people's rights, including the right to obtain bail in cases filed under these provisions and rules.An HC bench comprising Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain and Justice Farid Ahmed ...
(read more) Monday, June 16th, 2008Torture in custody caused serious spinal injury to Tarique Rahman, the senior joint secretary general of BNP, said his attorney to a special court yesterday, urging it to look into the matter.During the hearing on charge framing in the Tk 21-crore bribery case against Tarique, former state minister for home affairs Lutfozzaman Babar and six others, Tarique's counsel barrister Rafiqul Islam Mia said, "Tarique was youthful and a completely fit individual at the time of his arrest, but he is physically impaired today. His spinal vertebrae had been damaged due to tortures in detention.""To ensure justice, the court should look ...
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