National charter finalisation by this month, Ali Riaz says, as 2nd round reform talks underway

National Consensus Commission Vice Chairman Prof Ali Riaz today said they aim to finalise the national charter by this month.

"Our goal is to achieve a charter by the 31st of July, which is expected by all. Everyone in the country is expecting that," he said while chairing the second round of reform talks with political parties at the Foreign Service Academy in Dhaka.

Ali Riaz further said, "We want to finalise the national charter by July. You [political parties] also undoubtedly want this. So, we can proceed further. We have already reached consensus on many issues. There are some issues that need to be settled through discussions."

Regarding the framework of the upper house of the proposed bicameral parliament, he said the commission is currently reviewing the matter, and it needs some more time. "We are now reviewing your [political parties] various positions."

He said in addition to reviewing the parties' insights, the commission will be able to make a decision regarding upper house formation by considering the possible reactions to the establishment of the house and other related issues. "We hope to be able to make a decision on this in two to three days."

Commenting on the reform proposal regarding caretaker government system, he said, "After discussions over several days, the commission had submitted multiple proposals for consideration. In this context, discussions were held on the proposal submissions from political parties."

To this end, he said they have received proposals from the Revolutionary Workers Party, BNP, NCP and Jamaat-e-Islami. "After reviewing them in various ways, a comprehensive proposal has been presented based on the summary of the discussions of the parties over the past few days. Hopefully, we will be able to move towards a conclusion [over caretaker government] through discussions today."

Ali Riaz added, "We have all been involved in the struggle to re-establish the caretaker government system for the last 14 years. At that point, we agreed on the re-establishment of the caretaker government. The commission believes that now we can come to a point of agreement on the structure of the chief adviser [of caretaker government system]."

During today's dialogue, several other constitutional issues, including the more than one posts held by the PM are scheduled to be discussed.

Some 30 political parties, including the BNP, Jamaat-e-Islami and NCP, are taking part in the talks to present their respective positions on the proposed reforms.

The Consensus Commission aims to finalise a unified stance on key reform proposals by 31 July after completing discussions on nearly 20 major constitutional issues during the ongoing second-round dialogue.

On 2 June, Chief Adviser and Commission Chairman Muhammad Yunus inaugurated the second round of dialogues.

Formed on 15 February 2025, under the leadership of CA Yunus, the Commission was tasked with forging a unified national stance on crucial state reforms.

The Commission held its first round of talks between 20 March and 19 May engaging with 33 political parties and alliances.