Bangladesh News

The pledges for seeking votes in the upcoming city corporation polls have remained the same: corruption and criminal activities would be rooted out, development work would be done, city corporation offices would be freed from political influence and so on. Only the persons making the pledges have changed.

Those who made the pledges five-six years back are now behind bars because they did exactly the opposite to what they said by engaging in corruption. This time it is the new faces that are making the old pledges as mayoral candidates.

This has created doubts among the residents of these four cities–Khulna, Rajshahi, Barisal and Sylhet. The common question voters of these cities posed while talking to The Daily Star was “Would these aspirant mayors stick to their pledges at all?”

The previous mayors of the four city corporations–Sheikh Tayabur Rahman of Khulna, Mizanur Rahman Minu of Rajshahi, Mujibur Rahman Sarwar of Barisal and Badar Uddin Ahmad Kamran of Sylhet–committed to curb corruption and criminal activities. But the city corporation offices turned into a hub of corruption and criminal and political activities during their tenure. All the four are now detained on corruption charges.

The elections to Barisal and Sylhet city corporations were held in 2003 and Khulna and Rajshahi in 2002.

City dwellers said the previous mayors not only ignored their commitments, but also misused power politically. Development work has not been done in the last several years while services like road communications, water and power supply and drainage system remain as poor as ever, they said.

RAJSHAHI
Ahead of the election to Rajshahi City Corporation (RCC), most electorate have observed that they have been cheated in the last five years as the city has remained underdeveloped, reports our correspondent in Rajshahi.

BNP lawmaker Mizanur Rahman Minu, now convicted in an extortion case, never paid heed to people’s reminders of his mayoral election pledges including bringing natural gas supply to the city, industrial boost, not increasing taxes, building educational institutes, constructing new roads and expanding the existing ones.

City dwellers alleged that the RCC itself was made the centre of corruption and crime although Minu’s main electoral pledge was to eliminate them.

He also pledged to make Rajshahi a drug-free city but at least 60,000 bottles of banned phensidyl used to enter the frontier city every day, said a businessman.

Government land was grabbed while extortion by ruling party men was common.

The present mayoral candidates and also those who contested last time also did little to force the authorities to follow these pledges during the last five years, many city dwellers alleged, expressing pessimism about any positive change in case politicians who become active only during elections come out successful this time.

Mayoral candidate AHM Khairuzzman Liton declared a 23-point election pledge that includes taking initiatives for producing 50-60MW electricity to solve power crisis, establishing a silk-based industry and an industry-based export processing zone (EPZ) and adopting a master plan for the development of greater Rajshahi, reports our Rajshahi University correspondent.

Enamul Haque declared a 21-point election pledge including establishing a centre to build skilled manpower; Durul Huda announced a 15-point election pledge including reducing unemployment; Mosaddek Hossain Bulbul unofficially announced a 10-point pledge; Masudul Haque Dulu announced a 20-point pledge; and Raihanur Rahman announced an 18-point pledge including establishing transparency in the RCC.

BARISAL
BNP district unit President Mujibur Rahman Sarwar, who committed to curb criminal activities, was elected the mayor of Barisal City Corporation (BCC). However, the mayor himself allegedly had criminals around him who resorted to different criminal activities including manipulating tenders.

Sarwar allegedly took percentage from each development work. He turned the BCC office into a political hub of the BNP-Jamaat coalition, appointing a large number of men at the BCC office from the parties.

He has been charged with corruption, killing, extortion and illegal arms possession, among others.

The present mayoral candidates are now going door to door with the same pledges giving priority to carrying out development work and curbing criminal activities and corruption, reports our correspondent in the city.

Advocate Enayet Pir Khan has pledged to curb criminal activities. “There would be no political influence on the city corporation if I am elected,” he said.

Shawkat Hossain Hiron said he does not want to cheat by placing unreal pledges. “If I am elected, I will do what is necessary, especially development of the city,” he said.

Ebaidul Haque Chan said he would form a nagorik committee in every ward comprising non-political persons and would carry out development work recommended by elected ward councillors.

Former mayor Ahsan Habib Kamal who is accused of several corruption charges has pledged to curb corruption from the city corporation.

SYLHET
The mayoral candidates of Sylhet City Corporation (SCC) polls have pledged to eliminate corruption from the corporation.

Detained SCC Mayor Badar Uddin Ahmed Kamran, a candidate of this SCC polls, had pledged to curb corruption in SCC ahead of the 2003 elections. He is now detained in the Kitchen Market scam case filed in connection with illegally awarding the work order for a kitchen market to serve his interest.

His plans for the city’s overall development and making it a city that draws tourists have not materialised yet.

As he is detained since May last year, Nagorik Committee is running his campaign pledging to make the SCC free from political influence and continue the development works in the city.

All most all other mayoral candidates have made curbing corruption their prime electoral pledge.

Mayoral candidate MA Haque, defeated in the first SCC polls by Kamran, is repeatedly talking about eliminating corruption and criminal activities in the SCC and making it an organisation accountable to the people.

AFM Kamal, also in the mayoral race, has stressed the need for making the SCC an “affective organisation in the real sense”.

Candidates Babrul Hossain Babul and Abdul Mukit Khan pledged that if elected, their first job would be to make the SCC free from corrupt people and corruption. Their pledges also include eliminating the water crisis and recovering occupied land of water bodies.

KHULNA
Curbing corruption and making the Khulna City Corporation (KCC) a public welfare-body are the prime electoral pledges of mayoral candidates in the KCC polls.

KCC Mayor Sheikh Tayebur Rahman was convicted and sentenced to 17 years’ imprisonment in two separate extortion cases. He had pledged to curb corruption and develop the city in 2003 elections.

This time, the mayoral candidates are making similar commitments along with serving the people with utmost sincerity, honesty and diligence.

Five mayoral candidates sat together yesterday at “Face-the-People” dialogue at Zia Hall in the city and pledged to work together for the welfare of the city people no mater what the outcome of KCC election is.

They also pledged to shun nepotism and politicisation, make KCC accountable to the people, make the best use of KCC resources and increase revenue earnings.

The five candidates are: Talukder Abdul Khaleque, Feroze Ahmed, Moslem Uddin, Prof Taibur Rahman and Enayet Ali

Shushashoner Janney Nagorik (Shujan) organised the programme. Shujan Khulna district committee President Prof Mohammad Zafar Imam chaired the programme and Channel i, The Daily Star and Prothom Alo were the media partners of the event.