Prime mover owners, workers postpone strike in Chittagong Port until Oct 4

Prime mover owners and workers have postponed their strike in Chittagong Port until Oct 4 after Chittagong Metropolitan Police commissioner on Friday assured them of action against alleged harassment of workers.

Prime Mover-Trailer Owners and Workers' Unity Council called the strike on Monday for a seven-point charter of demand, including that of cancelling fine for transportation of goods beyond the fixed ceiling.

The association alleged that since the government fixed the ceiling on Aug 16, its workers are harassed whenever Prime trailers are found carrying more than the ceiling.

The strike had almost crippled the port. After two other organisations of transporters announced to join the strike, apex trade body FBCCI on Thursday urged early solution to the stalemate that was hurting export and import.

Amidst this situation, CMP Commissioner Iqbal Bahar Chowdhury sat with the striking transporters on Friday morning after talks on Thursday failed to find a way out of the situation.

After the meeting with the CMP chief, the Unity Council's Joint Convenor Golam Mawla quoted authorities as saying that each prime mover would be allowed to carry up to 42.5 tonnes of goods.

To reduce the damage of roads, the authorities on Aug 16 imposed an upper limit on the maximum permissible load that a container carrying vehicle could tow.

Transport owners say while they have little to do about container weight, they are being fined Tk 2000 for every ton above the maximum permissible load of 33 tonnes, and the workers are being harassed for the fine at the weighbridges along Dhaka-Chittagong Highway.

Mawla said the CMP chief also pledged to make arrangements for collecting the fines from the owners of the containers, not the transporters.

Chittagong Prime Mover-Trailer Workers' Union General Secretary Humayun Kabir told bdnews24.com the strike was postponed until an inter-ministerial meeting scheduled for Oct 4.

The leaders of the transporters' associations said the next course of action would be set after the meeting.

Until Thursday, over 40,000 undelivered 20-foot containers were stranded, paralysing the port with a capacity of 36,000 containers.

CMP commissioner Chowdhury told reporters that the Oct 4 meeting would focus on keeping international standards in laws related to freight weight.

"I hope a decision is taken after analysing all the facts so that no such problem occurs in the future," he said.

Workers' leader Kabir said the CMP chief spoke to Road Transport and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader and confirmed the assurance about the new ceiling.

"We were also reassured of facing only one weighbridge on the highway, not all of them," he added.