- BM Report
“Businessmen are not now satisfied with low profits, they have become Frankenstein; so their greed for exorbitant profits causes the price hike in consumer goods. People are suffering due to unusual rise commodity prices.”
Consumers Association o Bangladesh (CAB) president Golam Rahman left this comment while he was speaking as the chief guest at the Debate for Democracy’s shadow parliament on “market monitoring to protect consumer rights”. The event was held on Thursday, at the BFDC auditorium.
He said the government needs to be hard with businessmen if it wants to curb inflation.
Rahman pointed out that 62 percent of the cabinet members are businessmen. They dominate the parliament, the government so market policy formulation and implementation.
Rahman said that the Bangladesh Bank has raised interest rates and forex rates following the advice of donors and thus rate of inflation continues to rise.
He said that the government says there is no syndicate; but when a few businessmen control the whole market,.this is defined as syndicate.
This is not possible to bring relief for consumers through typical market monitoring, he added.
The Director General of the National Consumer Rights Protection Directorate, A. H. M. Safikuzzaman spoke to the function. as a special guest.
Debate for Democracy president Hasan Ahmed Chowdhury Kiran said, “Not only the consumers, but the government is also made hostage by the market syndicate. The political weakness of the government is behind no controll to syndicates and corporate marketers.
The debaters of Dhaka Medical College won the championship, defeating the debaters of Southeast University in the Shadow Parliament. The jury of the competition was comprised with journalists including Mainul Alam, Abul Kashem, Shah Alam Khan and Kaberi Moitreya.
Trophies and certificates were awarded to the participating teams at the end of the competition.
