No party here intends to deceive nation in fulfilling pledges, says Salahuddin at NCC talks

Following the extensive discussions at the National Consensus Commission (NCC) sessions, no political party involved intends to deceive the nation in fulfilling the commitments after the national election, BNP Standing Committee Member Salahuddin Ahmed said today (30 July).

"If any party had doubts about implementing the promises, they wouldn't have joined the discussion. I don't think there is any political party here that intends to deceive the nation," he told reporters during a break on the 22nd day meeting of the consensus commission held at the Foreign Service Academy in the capital.

The BNP leader said all political parties are participating in the discussions openly, and the entire nation is witnessing the process.

"After the talks, a declaration will be issued bearing the signature of the chief adviser and national leaders. That document will also be published on the [NCC] website. Even after that, will any party dare to disobey?"

"I don't think there can be a bigger Memorandum of Understanding than this. There can be no bigger document than this," Salahuddin added.

Regarding the commission's draft proposal, he said the commission has provided a draft, in fact sent an introduction, which includes a declaration of commitment.

"They stipulated that this must be completed within two years of parliament's formation, and we agree with that," he said.

He added that reforms are being implemented in various ministries through ordinances, saying, "Except for constitutional amendments, all other proposed reforms can be carried out during this government's tenure."

Noting that there was little progress in today's discussions, he mentioned that BNP had proactively supported many of the consensus commission's proposals. However, he added that no consensus was reached on the issue of women's reserved seats due to reservations from several parties.

The BNP standing committee member also said the consensus commission had initially presented a spreadsheet compiling recommendations from five reform commissions, which caused "some confusion."

"But we went through the issues point by point. Out of the 826 recommendations, we agreed with nearly 650. In total, we disagreed with 51," he said.

Out of 131 constitutional reform proposals, BNP directly agreed with 115 and provided suggestions on the remaining and 20 topics are currently under discussion at the consensus commission, Salahuddin added.

He said that BNP agreed with 46 out of 47 recommendations of the Anti-Corruption Commission reform body, for public administration reform, they accepted 187 out of 208.

In the judicial reform category, BNP agreed with 62 out of 89 and partially with nine and for election commission reform, they agreed with 141 out of 243, said the BNP leader.

Regarding police reform, he said the party agreed with almost all of the 108 proposals, although they found no "rich recommendations" in that section.