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Published : 19 Jun 2025, 02:22 PM
Protesting government employees have staged a blockade at the Secretariat -- the nerve centre of Bangladesh's administration -- to demand the scrapping of the Government Service (Amendment) Ordinance.
They brought out a procession at 11:15am on Thursday from the Employees Unity Council office at the Secretariat and gathered at Badamtala. Then the procession marched through different alleys inside the Secretariat.
Although employee attendance was low at Tuesday and Wednesday's protests, around a thousand of employees took part in the protests on Thursday.
The protesters dragged interested employees into the procession and chanted several slogans against "fascism".
At one point, they gathered near the Cabinet building and announced a blockade for administrative building No. 4 before blocking the building.
Badiul Kabir, co-chairman of the Secretariat Officers and Employees Unity Forum, said: “We hope that our demand will be fulfilled in the next 48 hours. Otherwise, we’ll stage a blockade near the finance ministry.”
“We don’t want to continue the protests. Please meet our demands and order us to go back to work.”
The forum Co-Chairman Md Nurul, Co-General Secretary Mojahidul Islam Selim and others were seen at the forefront of the procession.
Selim told bdnews24.com, “We want the total scrapping of the ordinance; they want to amend it. We want it nullified with no amendments.”
“The committee held meetings in two rounds without involving the employees. We said that if it is scrapped, we’ll celebrate by distributing sweets to everyone.”
On May 25, the government issued the Government Services (Amendment) Ordinance. However, the Secretariat employees have been protesting the ordinance, demanding its repeal, and calling it regressive. They have also threatened to escalate the protests to government offices across the country if the law is not repealed.
Under the circumstances, a committee headed by Law Advisor Asif Nazrul was formed on Jun 4, to review the situation surrounding the ordinance. The committee has already held two meetings.
