Workers and employees of the Chattogram port will continue with their eight-hour work abstention programme for the third day today over the planned leasing of New Mooring Container Terminal to the UAE-based operator DP World.

The programme will continue until the government cancels its move to hand over the NCT to a foreign operator, said Md Ibrahim Khokan, general secretary of Chattogram Bandar Jatiyabadi Sramik Dal.

Although operations like loading, unloading of cargo and containers from vessels, as well as cargo and container delivery from port yards, resume in full swing after 4:00pm, the port will face yard congestion soon if the stalemate prolongs, said Fazley Ekram Chowdhury, president of the Berth Operators, Ship-Handling Operators and Terminal Operators Owners Association.

He urged all to find solutions through discussion rather than crippling the country’s main seaport.

Neither the port authority nor the government are yet to initiate any discussion with the protesters, said Md Humayun Kabir, coordinator of Bandar Rokkha Songram Parishad.

The authorities have instead taken punitive measures by transferring and placing on standby several protesting labour leaders, he said.

The Chittagong Port Authority (CPA) yesterday transferred seven more CPA employees to Pangaon Inland Container Terminal (ICD) in Keraniganj and Kamalapur ICD in Dhaka. The seven employees were actively taking part in the work abstention.

Meanwhile, Bangladesh Jubo Arthanitibid Forum, a philanthropic organisation, yesterday moved a fresh petition before a chamber judge of the Supreme Court seeking an order of status quo on the entire process until the filing of a leave to appeal petition against the High Court verdict on the issue.

“The national parliamentary election is imminent, and at such a critical, sensitive and transitional juncture, the intended execution of the disputed contract amounts to an act of manifest executive high-handedness, arbitrariness and mala fide exercise of power on the part of the government,” Md Anwar Hossen, one of the lawyers for the petitioner, told The Daily Star.

If the court is not pleased to pass an order of status quo, the petitioners will suffer irreparable loss and injury and the rights and interests of the public at large will be materially prejudiced, he added.

The deal signing procedure with the foreign operator is being carried out by the government through the Public Private Partnership Authority following the PPP guideline, said CPA Secretary Md Omar Faruk in a press briefing.

“So far, there is no news of the deal being signed — it is not right to start agitation and movement before the signing,” he said, adding that such work abstention is having an impact on the port’s normal activities.

Regarding the transfer of employees, he said it was a routine transfer done for an emergency official requirement.
Source: The Daily Star