Dhaka, Dec 10 (bdnews24.com) — Finance Minister A M A Muhith on Monday said he will brief media on the latest status of the Padma bridge project after learning from the Anti-Corruption Commission about their inquiry findings.
His statement came days after the World Bank external panel of experts left Bangladesh without a consensus on who should be accused in the case recommended by the inquiry committee over what it said ‘conspiracy to exchange bribe’ in the project.
“I will talk to the Anti-Corruption Commission about the development it has made through investigations into the allegations of corruption raised by the World Bank. Then I will give a statement on the overall situation,” said Muhith.
The Finance Minister was speaking with journalists at his Secretariat office.
Muhith has been giving statements on the bridge project every now and then. He is one of the many ruling party Ministers and MPs who often talk about construction of the bridge, since the project was one of their major election pledges.
Three days after the World Bank panel left undecided, World Bank’s Resident Representative in Bangladesh Allen Goldstein on Dec 8 said they would not disburse the pledged loan for the bridge until ACC completed a ‘fair and thorough’ probe into the allegations of corruption in the project.
The next day Muhith said he was surprised by the World Bank statement.
The World Bank cancelled its $ 1.2-billion loan to fund the $2.9-billion project in September, and pulled itself out of the project in June raising the corruption allegations.
The global lending agency formed a three-member panel, as per the deal reached with the government, for supervising the ACC probe into its allegation. The team visited Bangladesh twice.
On Dec 5, the team left after failing to reach consensus with ACC over who should be accused in the graft case to be filed based on the ACC inquiry. The inquiry traced ‘conspiracy to exchange bribe’ in the project.
The inquiry report recommended filing graft case against less than 10 people for their involvement in the ‘conspiracy.’
Goldstein in her statement said the World Bank panel would let Bangladesh know about its decision once ACC decided over the list of accused.
Source: Bd News24