Chief Adviser holds meeting with political leaders

The interim government has begun the second phase discussion with political parties in order to reach a consensus on state reforms.

The discussion started around 5:00pm today, Monday with National Consensus Commission’s Chief and Chief Adviser Professor Muhammad Yunus in chair.

A total of 30 political parties have been invited to today’s meeting at the Bangladesh Foreign Service Academy auditorium.

Among the leaders who joined the meeting are Salahuddin Ahmed, Standing Committee Member of the BNP; Ismail Zabiullah, Adviser to the BNP Chairperson; and lawyer Ruhul Kuddus. From Jamaat-e-Islami, Syed Abdullah Mohammad Taher, Nayeb-e-Ameer, and Hamidur Rahman Azad, Assistant Secretary General, were present. Also in attendance were Jonayed Saki, Chief Coordinator of Ganosamhati Andolon; Nahid Islam, Convenor of the National Citizen Party (NCP); Akhtar Hossain, Member Secretary; and Sarwar Tushar, Joint Convener, along with leaders from various other political parties.

The Consensus Commission sources said the commission will hold topic-wise discussion with political parties after the Chief Adviser meets the parties.

According to sources within the Consensus Commission, after the Chief Adviser holds meetings with the political parties, there will be issue-based discussions between the commission and the parties. These thematic discussions will take place once before the holy Eid-ul-Azha and then continue afterward in phases. This round of talks will focus especially on core proposals from the Constitutional Reform Commission where consensus has yet to be achieved.

The Consensus Commission aims to prepare a "July Charter" based on agreements reached with the political parties during these discussions.

In October of last year, the interim government formed six reform commissions on the constitution, electoral system, public administration, judiciary, Anti-Corruption Commission, and police. These commissions submitted their full reports in February. The National Consensus Commission was launched on 15 February to build agreement around the reform proposals.

Excluding the Police Reform Commission, the remaining five commissions had 166 key proposals, which were sent in chart to the political parties for feedback. Then, starting 20 March, the first phase of one-on-one discussions with the parties began, which concluded on 19 May. In this phase, the commission held talks with 33 political parties.

On 26 May, the Consensus Commission held a press conference to present the progress of the first phase. At the event, Professor Ali Riaz, Vice Chair of the commission, highlighted both the areas where consensus had been reached and where it had not.

At the time, the Consensus Commission acknowledged that no agreement had yet been reached on several critical constitutional matters, including the structure for decentralising the judiciary, appointment and tenure of the Chief Adviser of the caretaker government, formation of the National Constitutional Council (NCC), term limits for the office of Prime Minister, the number of posts a Member of Parliament may simultaneously hold, the process of electing the President, and the procedure for constitutional amendments.

However, the commission noted that many political parties have expressed interest in further discussion and have shown flexibility on these unresolved issues.