The new government has started its endeavor and the ministries have been allocated to 25 ministers and 11 state ministers. According to the experts, lots of challenges are ahead of them. They might have to face tough condition in political, economic and diplomatic fields, as well as have to tackle the matters like dollar crisis, ever-increasing inflation and control the market, in addition to bring reforms in various sectors.
Ex-governor of Bangladesh bank, Dr Salehuddin Ahmed said, “The big challenge of the government is to return the political stability and increase the trust of the people, along with reformation of all sectors. They have to make an outline of 100 days and implement it.”
He said to The Bangladesh Pratidin, “Reforms, good governance, accountability must be ensured. Without transparency, clarity, accountability, there will be no good outcome.”
Dr. Salehuddin Ahmed said we need to increase our source of income. Then the bite of inflation will be a little less. Small scale industries should be given importance to increase income, source of income and employment. Our institutions have weakened. Their capacity should be increased. Bangladesh Bank, NBR, ACC and other state institutions should bring structural reforms and increase their capacity as no state can stand strong without institutional capacity.
Executive Director of Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) Iftekharuzzaman said, “No matter how the cabinet is analyzed or who got which ministry, how much the twelfth parliament and the new cabinet will be able to ensure accountable good governance and public welfare government in a transparent political arena and governance structure with unlimited power, this is the big question. Only time can answer it.”
He said this in response to a question from The Bangladesh Pratidin about the challenges of new ministers. The TIB chief said, “The success of new ministries depends on how much the members of the party can demonstrate the ‘Learning from the mistakes of the past’ according to the Prime Minister's declaration or the party's election manifesto.”
Abu Alam Shahid Khan, former secretary of the ministry of Local Government said, “There are political, economic and diplomatic challenges ahead of the new cabinet. They have to work for systemic changes to deal with these.”
He said, “The new members of the cabinet are selected from a special party. That party had a manifesto, promising something to the people. How they will implement those promises is the first challenge before them.”
Shahid Khan said there are three challenges in general. There is a political conflict-problem that needs to be solved. Our economy is another big challenge. There are fuel shortages, inflation, income inequality, commodity price hikes and syndicates. Government has taken many loans from banks. There is a dollar crisis. Low income people are facing many challenges.
He said there are political and diplomatic challenges. To overcome these challenges, there is no easy way to deal with political, economic or diplomatic challenges. Considering these as large-scale issues, systematic changes should be made. There is a parliament in the country; we all know how it works. There are opposition parties in parliament, they have roles. Since there is no opposition party, how it will run now, what will be the focal point of the discussion, have to be found out. There are syndicates, which we could not break even in the last 10-15 years. Banks are being robbed, money is being smuggled. Each has specific goals to work towards. There is the challenge of curbing corruption, along with challenge of protecting politics from political crooks.
(The report was published on print and online versions of The Bangladesh Pratidin on January 11 and rewritten in English by Lutful Hoque Khan)
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