Budget anti-people, designed to plunder nat'l wealth: BNP

Terming the national budget for FY23-24 as anti-people and deceptive BNP on Wednesday said it has been designed to loot several billion dollars of national wealth under the shelter of a corrupt regime.

Speaking at a press conference, party secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir also said it will not be possible to ensure people's welfare through the budget which is unrealistic and imaginary.

“The newly presented budget is just an annual manifesto of the current ‘fascist looter’ government to maintain the continuity of the economic corruption,” he said.

Fakhrul, also a former teacher of economics, said the budget is highly ambitious and implementable. 

“It’s just the budget of the plunderers made with the aim of looting billions of dollars under the shelter of the current corrupt government,” he said.

BNP arranged the press conference to give the party's formal reaction to the proposed budget for FY2023-2024, six days after the finance minister presented it in the national parliament.

In the budget, Fakhrul said, the finance minister did not acknowledge the ongoing economic crisis, growing income disparity, dwindling foreign exchange reserves, rampant money laundering, and huge debt burden on the shoulders of the country’s people. 

He said the government also did not give any outline in the budget about how to overcome the economic crises and challenges and completely avoided the concept of good governance and justice.

“There is also no direction in the budget to prevent widespread corruption and money laundering. This anti-people budget will not play any role in protecting the interests of common people,” the BNP leader observed.

He said no major structural reforms have been undertaken in the past decade in policy issues, the banking system, the revenue sector, or other essential sectors, including the financial one. “There is no indication of these reforms in this budget either.”

In smart Bangladesh, Fakhrul said, the government this time gave the budget for plundering money smartly. “They (govt) are smart at stealing, including vote theft, bank theft, and money laundering.”

The BNP leader also said all arrangements have been made in the budget to smartly loot lakhs of crores of taka, plunder banks, and public money through a syndicate.

Fakhrul said the ongoing economic and political crisis in Bangladesh has become the main national crisis of the country.

“It’s not possible to formulate a budget for the welfare of people and economy and implement it without democratic and accountable government,” he observed.

He said an accountable, democratic, and responsible elected government must be established to get rid of the ongoing national crisis. “The only way to do this is to hold a free, fair, impartial, inclusive and acceptable election under a polls-time impartial government.”