No bar to serving as Gazipur mayor

MA Mannan was elected mayor of Gazipur City Corporation in July, 2013. But he could be in office for only some 18 months.

It's because the mayor, accused in 30 cases, was in jail for the rest of the time. He had also been suspended twice.

However, the Supreme Court yesterday paved the way for Mannan to discharge his duty as an elected public representative.

It upheld a High Court order that had stayed a government decision to suspend him. The government took the decision after a court accepted a charge sheet in a case filed against Mannan.

A four-member bench of the Appellate Division headed by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha passed the order, dismissing an appeal filed by the government seeking a stay on the HC order.

Mahbub Uddin Khokon, Mannan's lawyer, told The Daily Star that after the Supreme Court verdict, there was no legal bar for Mannan to hold the office.

Mannan,  an adviser to BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia, became the mayor beating an Awami League-backed candidate by around one and half lakh votes in the elections held on July 6, 2013. He assumed office on August 18 the same year.

On February 11, 2015, police arrested Mannan for his suspected involvement in an arson attack on a bus in Gazipur on February 4.

The next month, panel mayor, local Awami League leader Asadur Rahman Kiron, who was elected a councillor in the city corporation polls, was made acting mayor upon a court directive. He has been holding the post since then.

Mannan was released from jail on March 2, 2016. However, he was rearrested on April 15 the same year. The BNP leader was released again on this January 7.

The LGRD ministry suspended Mannan on April 18 last year after a court accepted a charge sheet in a criminal case filed against him.

Following a writ petition, the HC later stayed the suspension order.

Contacted, Mannan told The Daily Star that all 30 cases were filed after he became the mayor. Of them, two were corruption and one was an extortion case. The rest were filed on charges of sabotage.

Of the 30 cases, charge sheets were submitted only in five cases and the mayor was suspended based on two of them.

“I got the chance to serve my people for only one and half year. So, I could not fulfil most of my promises,” he told The Daily Star, adding that things might change following the SC order.