Ministers get new portfolios in major cabinet shuffle

In a major cabinet shake-up, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has changed portfolios of three ministers and tasked the four new members with responsibilities.

With a year left of the Awami League government’s second consecutive term, the existing cabinet members who were re-designated came from the ruling party’s allies.

Rashed Khan Menon will be replaced by AKM Shajahan Kamal, a new cabinet member, as civil aviation and tourism minister.

Menon, the head of Workers’ Party of Bangladesh, has been given the job of the social welfare ministry.

Rashed Khan Menon

Anwar Hossain Monju

Anisul Islam Mahmud

Tarana Halim

Cabinet Secretary Mohammad Shafiul Alam announced the new assignments for the ministers during a media briefing at the secretariat in Dhaka on Wednesday.

The prime minister swapped Anwar Hossain Monju and Anisul Islam Mahmud’s portfolios.

Monju, who leads a breakaway faction of former military dictator HM Ershad's Jatiya Party, is now in charge of the water resources ministry.

Hasina transferred Mahmud, a Jatiya Party presidium member, to the forest and environment ministry.

Narayon Chandra Chanda

Mustafa Jabbar

AKM Shajahan Kamal

Kazi Keramat Ali

One of the newest additions to the cabinet, Mustafa Jabbar, a technocrat, has been designated as telecom and IT minister as expected. However, State Minister for Telecom Tarana Halim has been shunted to the information ministry.

Narayon Chandra Chanda, who was elevated to a minister at a swearing-in ceremony on Tuesday, will head the fisheries and livestock ministry, where he had served as the state minister for the last four years.

Kazi Keramat Ali, the new state minister, will be in charge of the education ministry’s Madrasa and Technical Education Division.