The New Nation - Internet Edition

Bdnews24.com, Dhaka

Jatiya Sangsad speaker Jamiruddin Sircar has said he has no authority to tell former lawmakers to vacate the NAM flats they are living in.

The speaker clarified his position on the apartments in a letter addressed to chief adviser Fakhruddin Ahmed Sunday.

The correspondence, a copy of which was obtained by bdnews24.com yesterday, makes clear the speaker's opinion that the NAM flats were allocated to the former members of parliament in accordance with a decision made by a Sangsad committee (parliament committee).

"According to the decision of the parliament committee, the MPs of the eighth parliament will be eligible to live in the NAM flats until the declaration of the official results of the ninth parliamentary polls through publication of the gazette," Sircar said in the letter.

"Therefore there is no scope to cancel the allocation of the flats for the former MPs."

Sircar said the Parliament Secretariat, not the housing and pubic works ministry, was the legitimate owner of the flats.

Currently, 187 former legislators from different parties are living in the apartments.

In the letter, the speaker proposed that the dispute between the caretaker government and the former lawmakers could be resolved in a meeting between the Parliament Secretariat, the housing and public works ministry and eight of the former MPs.