PM, ministers, AG visit Bangabhaban.PID
Prime minister Sheikh Hasina along with two of her cabinet members and attorney general met the president, Abdul Hamid, at the presidential palace, Bangabhaban, on Wednesday evening.
Bangabhaban officials said the meeting between the head of the state and the head of the government was in progress until 9:00pm.
Ruling Bangladesh Awami League (AL) general secretary and road transport, and bridges minister Obaidul Quader, law minister Anisul Huq and attorney general Mahbubey Alam were present in Bangabhaban at the time of the meeting.
It was not, however, known immediately whether the ministers and the attorney general joined the meeting.
The president’s press secretary, Md. Joynal Abedina, told Prothom Alo that the meeting discussed the country’s existing flood situation. “During the meeting, the president asked the prime minister to instruct people’s representatives and government officials to stand by the flood-hit people,” he said.
Sheikh Hasina arrived in the Bangabhaban around 7:30pm.
UNB reported that apart from the existing flood situation, Hasina briefed the president the country’s overall situation as well.
Political analysts said the two topmost officials of the state might have discussed the issue of the Supreme Court verdict that scrapped the 16th constitutional amendment as the verdict created a huge stir in the political arena.
Earlier on 14 August, Obaidul Quader called on president Abdul Hamid at Bangabhaban, barely two days after his meeting with chief justice Surendra Kumar Sinha.
After the meetings, Quader said he apprised the president and the chief justice of his party’s stance on the 16th amendment annulment verdict and he will again have talks with the president and the chief justice on the matter.
The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court on 3 July this year scrapped the 16th amendment and restored the Supreme Judicial Council and the full text of the verdict was released 1 August, stirring a huge debate over which of the state organ is sovereign – is it the legislature or the judiciary?
The AL-led 10th parliament on 17 September 2014 unanimously passed the Constitution (Sixteenth Amendment) Bill restoring its power to remove Supreme Court judges on the grounds of misconduct or incapacity, scrapping the existing constitutional provisions for the Supreme Judicial Council inquiry into such allegations.
The country’s main opposition political party – Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) – has hailed the court verdict, calling it a historical one and accusing the AL of standing against the judiciary.
On the other hand, the Law Commission chairman and former chief justice ABM Khairul Haque observed that the 16th amendment verdict has effectively removed the judges’ accountability to the people.
The 799-page verdict has been written by the chief justice, Surendra Kumar Sinha, and the other six judges of the Appellate Division – Md. Abdul Wahhab Miah, Nazmun Ara Sultana, Syed Mahmud Hossain, Muhammad Imman Ali, Hasan Foez Siddique, and Mirza Hussain Haider – have concurred with the views of the chief justice.
In its observation in the verdict, the Supreme Court made some political comments like ‘parliament is dysfunctional’ and ‘no nation – no country is made of or by one person’ which have irked and grieved the ruling AL.
