THE PM last evening ordered the arrest of the owner of Rana Plaza and four other owners of garment factories who forced workers to work even after the discovery of cracks in the building. We thank her for it and point out that if this action was taken earlier at least Friday’s outburst of the workers — we can in no way be sympathetic to the lawlessness — may have been averted. Lack of immediate action created suspicions in their mind that owners, as in some previous cases, would get away. The very fact that the order for Rana’s arrest needed to come from the level of the PM, which should have been done at a lower level, speaks volumes for the autonomy of action enjoyed by our law enforcing agencies. Also we must point out that the crime of the building owner and those of the factory owners cannot be judged to be the same.
The PM should also immediately set up a high level judicial commission to investigate all big buildings in areas like Savar, Gazipur, Ashulia, Tongi and low lying areas where likelihood of faulty constructions is the highest. This is most urgent in view of her own comment that 90 per cent buildings in those areas may have faulty construction. The anger of the garment workers has accumulated over the several instances when similar garment factory collapse did not lead to either punishment or adequate compensation for the victims.
The real issue here is the collapse of governance in the housing sector. Rules are flouted literally at all levels. As is clear from the case of Rana Plaza construction starting from land acquisition, soil testing, to earth filling and making all sorts of construction, no legal guidelines were followed. The owner of the building itself, which was on one of the main traffic arteries of the city, had no permission to construct anything leave alone a nine story shopping cum factory complex. How could the owner do it, why Rajuk never intervened for so long, and how such an illegal building was allowed to operate for long, which has now cost us so many lives?
The question is will we learn from all this and put an end to such “death traps”?
Saturday, April 27, 2013
Bangladesh: Streamline the building sector
THE PM last evening ordered the arrest of the owner of Rana Plaza and four other owners of garment factories who forced workers to work even after the discovery of cracks in the building. We thank her for it and point out that if this action was taken earlier at least Friday’s outburst of the workers — we can in no way be sympathetic to the lawlessness — may have been averted. Lack of immediate action created suspicions in their mind that owners, as in some previous cases, would get away. The very fact that the order for Rana’s arrest needed to come from the level of the PM, which should have been done at a lower level, speaks volumes for the autonomy of action enjoyed by our law enforcing agencies. Also we must point out that the crime of the building owner and those of the factory owners cannot be judged to be the same.
The PM should also immediately set up a high level judicial commission to investigate all big buildings in areas like Savar, Gazipur, Ashulia, Tongi and low lying areas where likelihood of faulty constructions is the highest. This is most urgent in view of her own comment that 90 per cent buildings in those areas may have faulty construction. The anger of the garment workers has accumulated over the several instances when similar garment factory collapse did not lead to either punishment or adequate compensation for the victims.
The real issue here is the collapse of governance in the housing sector. Rules are flouted literally at all levels. As is clear from the case of Rana Plaza construction starting from land acquisition, soil testing, to earth filling and making all sorts of construction, no legal guidelines were followed. The owner of the building itself, which was on one of the main traffic arteries of the city, had no permission to construct anything leave alone a nine story shopping cum factory complex. How could the owner do it, why Rajuk never intervened for so long, and how such an illegal building was allowed to operate for long, which has now cost us so many lives?
The question is will we learn from all this and put an end to such “death traps”?
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