Perform or step aside

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Senior government secretaries, including the cabinet secretary and the principal secretary to the prime minister, have expressed dissatisfaction with the pace of work in…

Senior government secretaries, including the cabinet secretary and the principal secretary to the prime minister, have expressed dissatisfaction with the pace of work in ministries at a secretaries’ meeting convened on short notice.

They warned that officials who cannot carry out their duties efficiently and wholeheartedly to implement government decisions must make way for others, stressing that idling will not be tolerated.

Instead, official responsibilities must be discharged keeping in view the expectations of the people in the post-uprising period, according to instructions issued to the secretaries of all ministries and divisions to inject momentum into the administration.

This stern message was delivered at the second secretaries’ meeting held at the Secretariat yesterday, chaired by Cabinet Secretary Nasimul Ghani. The meeting began around 2:30pm and concluded around 4:00pm. A total of 53 secretaries out of 56 attended.

The first secretaries’ meeting after the Tarique Rahman-led government assumed office was held on September 15, eight months into its tenure.

Within two months of that meeting, the cabinet secretary abruptly called another one on a few hours’ notice, The Daily Star has learnt from at least four officials who attended the meeting.

According to sources, ABM Abdus Sattar, principal secretary to the prime minister, stressed the importance of upholding the prime minister’s trust in the bureaucracy.

Addressing the secretaries, he said the prime minister has immense faith in the civil service, but breaching that trust would certainly bring unwelcome consequences.

Reminding them that both the prime minister’s father and mother had served as heads of state and government, he said that politicians, in certain cases, do not present an accurate picture due to local feuds or internal grouping.

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