The Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD)) has said that the economic situation of the country was quite vulnerable during the rule of the previous totalitarian government.
However, there has not been much improvement in the last six months. The interim government could not increase employment opportunities.
A country cannot attract domestic and foreign investment unless there is political and institutional stability. Therefore the main target of the interim government should be creating a conducive environment for election as soon as possible. The independent research agency held the press conference at its office in the capital’s Dhanmondi today, Wednesday.
CPD executive director Fahmida Khatun presented the keynote in the press conference held under the title – “Bangladesh Economy 2024-25, Challenge of Fulfilling Expectations in Crisis Time”.
The CPD said the main reason behind the July uprising was lack of employment opportunities. The discriminatory policy further escalated the unemployment situation. The country was seeing increasing discrimination in every sector. However, the interim government could not increase employment after taking over.
Distinguished fellow at the CPD Mustafizur Rahman, research director Khandaker Golam Moazzem, research fellow Muntasir Kamal and Syed Yusuf Sadat were present among others at the press conference.
The agency says no government can sustain long without a public mandate. They want an election within the timeframe announced by the interim government.
Fahmida Khatun said, “The interim government has announced to hold the elections sometime between December this year and June next year. We want the election to be held as per the roadmap declared by the interim government. We need to get back to the democratic processes as soon as possible.”
There were also discussions on the government decision to impose 15 per cent VAT on different products.
CPD distinguished fellow Mustafizur Rahman said, “The decision to increase VAT when the common people are already suffering due to the high inflation rate. The inflation now doubles the income. The interim government had the chance to increase direct taxes. However, the government did not take that path. They are stressing on indirect taxes.”
He further said the government does not get all of the money from the tax paid by the people. The interim government had opportunities to work on these matters. But it didn’t. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) did not ask for increasing VAT. It asked to raise revenue. However, instead of increasing direct tax, the government is increasing indirect tax.
Fahmida Khatun said the growth rate of revenue collection as of October was only 3.7 per cent, which was 17.7 per cent at the same time previous year. It means that there has been a notable decline in revenue collection.
Apart from revenue collection, there have been no notable improvements in terms of implementation of the Annual Development Programme (ADP), inflation, employment and private investment.
Although the interim government took some initiative, there has been no success as yet.
The government made a commitment that it will make the power purchase agreements public. However, none of these agreements have been made public.
The CPD recently sought information on 28 power plants established during the regime of the previous government under the Right to Information Act. However, the government denied it citing national security threat.