PM hopes that Awami League will be re-elected to serve people again

residence yesterday.
Mentioning that her government believes in a strong local government system, she said her government has been working tirelessly to decentralize power. "We believe in a strong local government system so that the people can get desired services at their doorsteps," she said. The Prime Minister said the government has already handed over various departments to upazila and district councils to decentralize power as well as to ensure sustainable and balanced development.
She said that if voted to power in future, her government will undertake and implement various projects through district and upazila-wise development planning. Putting importance on solving various problems locally, the Prime Minister said upazila parishad and district council have been strengthened to lessen the sufferings of the general people. Sheikh Hasina described the process of formation of district and upazila parishad system through constitution of a commission with lawmakers and experts while Awami League was in power from 1996 t0 2001.
The Awami League President said Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman after independence started work to decentralize power through turning all sub-divisions into districts. "He also appointed governors to those districts to decentralize power," she said. But, she said, after the brutal assassination of the Father of the Nation in 1975, the initiatives for strengthening local government bodies to decentralize power were stopped. Sheikh Hasina said the country could not achieve desired development as the anti-liberation forces were in power for a long time.

Listing the present government's stunning success in different sectors, the Prime Minister said her government ensured overall development of the country. In this connection, she mentioned the socioeconomic uplift projects of the government including expanding social safety net and ICT services, distribution of free textbooks and stipend, setting up community clinic, giving subsidy on agriculture, introduction of bank account for farmers at only Tk 10 and fair price card and development in the power and energy sector.
Senior AL leaders Amir Hossain Amu and Tofail Ahmed, AL Presidium Members Sheikh Fazlul Karim Selim and Abdul Latif Siddiqui, PM's Advisor on Public Administration HT Imam, LGRD and Cooperatives Minister Syed Ashraful Islam and Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on LGRD and Cooperatives Ministry Advocate Rahmat Ali were present at the function.