The New Nation - Internet Edition

Staff Reporter

Political leaders, academics and representatives of non-government organisations at a discussion yesterday urged the government to formulate 'National Democratic Decentralisation Policy' within the framework of the constitution and engage all the stakeholders for ensuring a balanced development of the country.

They said that even after the 37 years of independence the nation has yet to witness a specific decentralisation policy.

They were of the opinion that the absolute power centralisations in all spheres of the sate affairs were hindering the development process.

Their observation came at the discussion on 'Campaign for Democratic Decentralisation' organised by Governance Advocacy Forum (GAF) at the CIRDAP auditorium.

Mohsin Ali, coordinator, GAF presented the keynote paper while Prof Salahuddin M Aminuzzaman, department of Public Administration of Dhaka University moderated the discussion.

It was also attended, among others, by former minister and AL presidium member Begum Matia Chowdhury and Mahmudur Rahman Manna, organising secretary of Awami League, Gayeshwar Chandra Roy, joint general secretary of BNP, Dr Atiur Rahman, Hasanul Huq Inu, president of Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal (JSD), Mujahidil Islam Selim, general secretary of Communist Party of Bangladesh (CPB), Ziauddin Ahmed Bablu, presidium member of Jatiya Party, Prof Akhter Hossain, Sardar M Asaduzzaman, programme office of DANIDA and Shila Tasnim, senior programme officer of Asia Foundation.

Begum Matia Chowdhury said decentralisation is the prerequisite of democracy. All the problems related to politics, economic and administrative should be resolved through democratic way.

Dr Atiur Rahman said the local development would be possible if the government allocated a portion of its budget to the local governments.

The demands that were made from the discussion include to govern the central and local bodies by the elected representatives, hand over some power and responsibilities to the local government, ensure one third women participation at all governing bodies and clear declaration from political parties to implement decentralisation.